In growing up I never had a kind, caring, wonderful mother to care about me. In fact, it was the opposite. But I knew what one would look like and act like by reading and observing other people and later being such a mother to my son. It wasn’t something I had to work on. It came from the heart, the desire to want the best for who I loved and to take action to make  sure it happened.

In all truthfulness, even though I didn’t have it as a child, I still at times feel a need for it and want a place of safety, kindness, and understanding to go to when I’m hurting and struggling. I don’t think I’m the only one that feels that way. That need appears most when I feel crushed by life and I’ve had more than I can take. The weariness is so prevalent, that I want to lay my burdens down, if only for a little while. The following poem describes it perfectly. It’s called, ” Rock Me To Sleep.”

Yu/stan/kema

 

                 ROCK ME TO SLEEP.

Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,

Make me a child again just for to-night!

Mother, come back from the echoless shore,

Take me again to your heart as of yore;

Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care,

Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair;

Over my slumbers your loving watch keep,

Rock me to sleep, mother-rock me to sleep!

Backward, flow backward, O tide of the years!

I am so weary of toil and of tears.

Toil without recompense, tears all in vain,

Take them and give me my childhood again!

I have grown weary of dust and decay,

Weary of flinging my soul-wealth away,

Weary of sowing for others to reap.

Rock me to sleep, mother-rock me to sleep!

Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrue,

Mother, O mother, my heart calls for you!

Many a summer the grass has grown green,

Blossomed and faded, our faces between;

Yet, with strong yearning and passionate pain,

Long I to-night for your presence again;

Come from the silence so long and so deep.

Rock me to sleep, mother. Rock me to sleep!

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Elizabeth Akers Allen