Song for a Fifth Child...(or any child)

i received a wonderful book from a dear friend of mine "I am a Mother" by Jane Clayson Johnson. i loved it and recommend it completely. Very lifting. She quoted part of one of my most favorite poems...can hardly read it without crying. it's title is Song for a Fifth Child, but i think it could go for any, don't you? Have a read.


Mother, oh Mother, come shake out your cloth


empty the dustpan, poison the moth,

hang out the washing and butter the bread,

sew on a button and make up a bed.


Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?

She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.
 

Oh, I've grown shiftless as Little Boy Blue

(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).

Dishes are waiting and bills are past due

(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).


The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew

and out in the yard there's a hullabaloo

but I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo.

Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?

(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
 


The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,

for children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow.

So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.

I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.