Mother

She gave me courage when I weakly said,
“O see how drifting, derelict, am I!
The tide runs counter, and the wind is high;
I see no channel through the rocks ahead.

My arm is impotent; what worth to trim
The bending sails! Look, I shall quaff a cup
To Fate, while the wild ocean swallows up
The shipwrecked youth, the man who lives in him.”

She said: “But thou hast valour, dear, too much
For such as this; thou hast grave embassy,
Given with thy birth; would’st thou thine honour smutch

With coward failing? Dear son, breast the sea.”
Firm-purposed from that hour, through wind and wave,
I brought my message till thou shelter gave.