p. 14 | My Mother’s Way by Gazelle Stevens Sharp

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 14, 1915

My Mother’s Way

By Gazelle Stevens Sharp

My mother had a happy way Of seeing every pretty thing. She always saw the sunset’s glow, The shadows floating cloudlets fling, A bud, a shell, a bit of moss, A dainty spray of cypress vine, Against the azure of the sky Where slender, leafless twigs entwine;

Saw tiny rainbows span the spheres Of shining dew on leaf and blade; A fragile insect’s gauzy wing, The shifting play of light and shade In sky and cloud, on bluff and plain; A dove’s smooth breast, the sumac’s glow, The “little wheels” made in the pool By sparkling raindrops falling slow.

Midst closely nibbled meadow grass She spied a daisy still uncropped; She saw a fern, a pebble bright, A feather by some song bird dropped, A flower in unaccustomed place, The touch of color on the hill From autumn leaves by frost lips kissed, Beside the way of trickling rill.

The old, sweet childhood days are gone, My mother, now a memory From out the past—the dear, dear past; Yet o’er and o’er comes back to me With all its power for happiness, The wealth of cheer and peace it brings, The influence of her blessed gift Of always seeing pretty things.

— Gazelle Stevens Sharp, in Christian Advocate.