Lightly she slept, that splendid mother mine

Who faced death, undismayed, two hopeless years....

(“Think of me sometimes, son, but not with tears

Lest my soul grieve,” she writes. Oh, this divine

Unselfishness!) ...

Her favourite print smiled down—

The stippled Cupid, Bartolozzi-brown—

Upon my sorrow. Fire-gleams, fitful, played

Among her playthings—Toby mugs and jade....

And then I dreamed that—suddenly, strangely clear—

A voice I knew not, faltered at my ear:

“Courage!” ... Your own dear voice, loved since, and known!

And now that she sleeps well, come times her voice

Whispers in day-dreams: “Courage, son! Rejoice

That, leaving you, I left you not alone.”