p. 26 | HOME AND HEALTH by Helen Adair

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Oct 9, 1913

HOME AND HEALTH

By Helen Adair

Mother

I CALL aloud her name: she answers not; Her chair stands lone beside the shadowy hearth; An awful silence smites my trembling heart With fear; an emptiness, that drives me mad. She must be here, her fragrance lingers round; But when I seek her room, she is not there.

Gone? my mother gone, no more to come? My life's companion and my childhood's friend, The only one who knew and understood My inmost hopes and fears, my joys and woes; The one, of all, whose love remained the same Through fickle youth and tried maturity, Whose patience with my weakness was great As was her pure unselfishness and love,— My mother gone?

O mother, mother, how I miss you, dear! I bow my weary head upon your chair, And floods of unavailing tears flow down. There are so many things I wish to tell You,— things that you would love to know. I long to ask your counsel in a matter That your experience alone could give. I want to kneel and pray with you once more, And feel your hand, in blessing, on my head; And, here, I brought your little favorite flower— And you are gone!

O God, my mother's God, I turn to thee! To whom else shall I, can I go, this hour? Thou hast the words of everlasting life. “As one his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.” Thy promise, Lord, I claim.

Uphold me in thine everlasting arms; Pillow my weary head upon thy breast; And fill this “aching void” within my heart With pure, unselfish love, from out the fount Whence mother's love was drawn. And if thou deem Me worthy, Lord, cast round me, as I kneel, My mother's beauteous mantle. Give me grace To carry on the work that she began. Thou prayer-hearing, prayer-answering God, I praise, and laud, and magnify thy name For this great peace and comfort thou hast given.

O, teach me how to comfort troubled hearts With this same comfort thou hast given me. — Helen Adair, in Signs of the Times.