The Old Wash Place

She was such a little mother-so absurdly young that while

Tears are trembling on my lashes at her memory, I smile

At the very youngness of her. Just a little girl she seems

Smiling at me from the distance, singing to me in my dreams

Lullabys we all remember; but I mostly see her face

Smiling through the clouds of steam which almost hide the old

wash place.

Sometimes in my dream a dogwood blossom glimmers in her

hair,

And I hear a redbirl whistle, and the dream is free from care;

Then a man comes in the picture in the dream and goes away

Waving to the little mother from the ranks of men in gray;

And from then the dogwood blossom never glimmers any more,

And the redbird sings no longer round the wash place as of

yore.

Three of us, and just the little bit of mother to the brood,

Singing while her heart was breaking in the woodland solitude,

Midst the homely tubs and kettle, and the soap-gourd, and the

stick-

The old battling stick-the memory clutches at my throat so

quick

That ,1 scarce can keep the sobs back, at the memory of the

face

Smiling bravely through the steam-clouds that surround the

old wash place.

Can wee children understand it, when a heart's about to break?

We were children, but we somehow seemed to know, for

mother's sake,

We must help to bear a burden which we could not compre-

hend;

And our puny arms about her seemed to strengthen, and to

lend

Her a strength no little bit of mother could have got else-

where

As she toiled about the wash place with her heart bowed

down with care.

Yes, I carried water for her, where the baby lay asleep

From the songs that sister sang her, where the wash lay in a

heap;

And I sought dry sticks and piled them 'neath the kettle!

All my joy

In the dream that comes back to me is that I was born a boy,

And could help the little mother, and was glad to help her

too,

In the tasks about the wash place where there was so much

to do;

Some days' tasks seemed over-dreary, and some days seemed

over-long,

But she'd catch our eyes fixed on her and would tremble into

song;

But the world of heartbreak throbbing through the counter-

feited joy

Somehow would play on the heartstrings of the little girl

and boy

And the little baby sister, till we'd snuggle face to face,

Heart to heart, her arms about us, kneeling at the old wash

place,

Then one morning came a message, came in with the morning's

gleam;

How it came is lost, or hidden in the shadows of the dream ;

But with it hope went out from her; and she seemed to hark

no more

For the voice across the distance, for the footstep at the door ;

And she knelt there in that wash place---knelt with sister-girl

and me---

And I know now that that moment was her soul's Gethsemane.

Then the washings came more often ; there were other heaps

of clothes;

Day by day the clouds of sudsy steam from the old kettle rose ;

Day by day her love grew stronger; in the worry and the smart

Of her heartache she would rush to and would clasp us to

her heart;

And would strive to coax her lips to curve into a snatch of

song;

But the wash place called and called her; and its tasks were

hard and long.

Not long since I heard a woman say, in sneering tones and

low:

"Huh! His mother did our washing! My own mother told

me so!"

Whiter than the dogwood blossom-purer than it e'er could

be-

Shone the truth of that vile whisper! For she did it all

for me

And for sister-girl and baby. Oh that whisper! It was base!

But a soul was born in heaven from that lowly old wash place!

Why, it doesn't seem that mother was quite grown up when

she died!

Such a little bit of mother! Oh, the years are long and wide

Since she went away and left us, with that sweet smile on

her face,

Leaving us but just the memory of that homely old wash place.

But I know that father called her, by the look that can1e and

passed

O'er her face! And we still love her-shall as long as life

shall last !

Poems for Declamation Table of Content