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A Mother’s Worth
A mother’s worth, it glows and gleams in eyes.
It beams in grins and giggles sent her way.
It echoes at the core of coos and cries.
It greets a burst of cheers and fears each day.
__It battles through the bawl of sleepless zones
__Worn weary to the marrow of the bones.
A mother’s worth is warmth in hands that hold
The hurts and hopes of hearts within her care.
It steers and smooths and spurs as years unfold.
It soothes the stinging edges of despair.
__Its kiss will quell a tear and salve a sore.
__Its roar will drive the devil from the door.
A mother’s worth lives on and blooms anew.
It blossoms in the bleakness of the night.
It flowers like the sun and pushes through
The spheres of time to shine its boundless light.
__The gift of selfless love that graces earth
__Is born from every wondrous mother’s worth.
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Susan Jarvis Bryant has poetry published on Lighten Up Online, Snakeskin, Light, Sparks of Calliope, and Expansive Poetry Online. She also has poetry published in TRINACRIA, Beth Houston’s Extreme Formal Poems anthology, and in Openings (anthologies of poems by Open University Poets in the UK). Susan is the winner of the 2020 International SCP Poetry Competition, and has been nominated for the 2022 Pushcart Prize.
An apt appreciation, Susan. Much of today’s malaise relates to a failure to recognize and prize this worth.
May your Mother’s Day be a joyous one!
Julian, you are absolutely right. I’m refusing to give in to those who want to wipe mothers from the face of the earth… hence my poem. Thank you for your comment and your Mother’s Day wishes – they’re much appreciated.
Perfect love.
Thank you very much, Rohini… perfect love, indeed! We need more of it in these hate-fueled times.
‘Its kiss will quell a tear and salve a sore.
Its roar will drive the devil from the door.’
Classic!
Thanks for the read, Susan.
Thank you, Paul. Every loving mother is blessed with a fierce roar… it comes with the territory. 😉
Excellent poem for the day and the 364 others.
Thank you!
Yes, this is definitely a year-round poem for all those loving mothers out there. Thank you, jd.
Once again you’ve taken on a subject which could easily become trite in a lesser poet’s hands and crafted something of great honesty and beauty from it. It’s not easy to express sentiments which we all feel in such a way as to make them seem fresh once more but, like your recent Ode To Spring, you’ve done it remarkably well.
Shaun, I really appreciate your words of encouragement. I will admit sweating the details of this one. I re-wrote it a few times before I was fully satisfied, which is most unusual for me. I’m glad it paid off. Thank you!
Another terrific poem Susan. Very touching. You must spend 48 hours a day writing all this great stuff!
Russel, you have me pegged. I write in my sleep and my head is constantly buzzing with new ideas. I don’t go anywhere without a pen and notepad… I’m insufferable. I’m thrilled you liked the poem… my reward for being addicted to poetry.
Lovely embrace of a poem, circling to end with the words that begin it. My favorite line is the central one where each alliterating verb introduces a new facet of motherly worth in action: “It steers and smooths and spurs as years unfold.”
Thank you very much, Margaret. You always manage to spot the finer details and for that I am grateful. A very happy Mother’s Day to you! I hope you are getting spoiled rotten.
Sorry, but Modern day Western women have made male children into wimps, all by design of The Globalists, why else do women always get the children… men should raise the boys, and women the girls, that is how most nations do it , except for Globalist Controlled Western Nations.
Thank you for your views, Cam. I don’t necessarily agree that women should raise girls and men boys, but I do believe the breakdown of the family has contributed to many of our societal problems. There is little (if any) respect for traditional family values when it comes to raising children… hell, these days science is cast aside when it comes to the identifying of males and females… what chance do our future generations stand in this absurd world. This is the entire purpose of my poem. I am celebrating what it means to be a mother and a woman and will continue to do so. I refuse to buy into evil and idiocy. Only women can be mothers and that is that… and by “woman” I mean a person with two X chromosomes.
My mother is not, and has never been, like that. She has always (to this day) encouraged me to be stronger and more confident, and to stand up for myself more. Take your contempt for mothers elsewhere, a group like this isn’t going to cotton to it.
My experience has been that it’s fathers who try to make their sons into wimps so they don’t have any competition. I shudder at the thought of only men being allowed to raise boys… Most countries don’t do this, and Western culture has never done this; read the literature of the past and see how much closer opposite-sex parents and children are than same-sex.
Plus, there’s modern culture shaming boys into believing that they’re merely defective girls, that being a boy is like being born with missing limbs; is it any wonder we see so many transgenders at such young ages?
Joshua, I’m sorry I missed this interesting comment. You make some intriguing and some valid points. I’m glad you had a good relationship with your mother – some aren’t so lucky. It’s the same with fathers – some are great, others not so much. I believe there’s a lot of truth in your observation on the shaming of boys these days… I believe that now extends to girls. It seems this generation of boys and girls are encouraged to be unaccepting of their gender… it’s shameful to be a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ in equal measure.
“Its kiss will quell a tear and salve a sore.
Its roar will drive the devil from the door.”
Perfect, Susan.
Jan, it’s lovely to hear from you. Thank you! ❤️
Susan, this is a spectacularly sweet poem which depicts a mother’s love in all of its permutations. There’s something particularly engaging about the highly developed alliterations in this one. At one level it’s reminiscent of baby talk (those grins and giggles make me gaga) but there’s a soothing quality as well and an energy — sort of perpetual motion which hides the bone weariness that raising a child can bring. I’m particularly fond of the lines “it’s kiss will quell a tear and salve a sore/It’s roar will drive the devil from the door.” It’s particularly touching, gratifying and reassuring to hear of a mother’s worth when family relationships are being scuttled in favor of ideological ones by a society of callous cynics. Wonderful work, Susan. Happy Mother’s Day!
Brian, thank you very much for your perspicacious comment. I wanted to tap into the life sustaining qualities of all those worthy mothers out there and celebrate their womanly assets and blessings to the full. Where would we be without them? I don’t want those living in the absurd world of androgenous “birthing persons” gatecrashing my party. I want to celebrate the womanly wonders of mothers, and I will as long as I am able.
SO GOO-GOO-GOOD!
GOO-GOO-GOOD! beats GA-GA-BAD any day, AB. I’m reveling in your comment!
What a wonderful poem for mothers everywhere. I have forwarded it on to my daughter who is a mother of two teenage boys. Our relationship has blossomed from mother-daughter, to mother-mother and a resulting amazing mother-friend relationship. Thank you for this Susan. It says it all.
Aww, Norma, what a wonderful relationship you have with your daughter. Motherhood often lifts a mother/daughter relationship to the beautiful realms of friendship… it’s the motherhood club that does it. I hope you both celebrated Mother’s Day to the full yesterday. I am thrilled my poem played its part. Thank you!
Susan, I thought of my own mother whilst reading this. She never had wealth or property but she could light a room up with her smile. Sorry to be late with my comment but this is a heart warmer if ever there was one. Cheers.
This is my thought exactly. I was going to say this, but you beat me to it!
Thank you very much for your lovely comment, Jeff. The worth of a mother isn’t found in earthly treasures and you say this beautifully. I’m certain your mother’s smile glows on in your heart… a priceless gift.