I fell in love with poetry
As boy upon my mother’s knee
She fed me rhymes to help me sleep
Read sonnets that would make me weep
She dressed me in a poet’s cloak
And sang to me each time I woke
Like Sappho, singing with her lyre
As I lay dreaming by the fire
Till Life dealt her that bitter blow
And sorrow in her soul did sow
Then she could voice her verse no more
Nor nurse me as she did before
Her sonnet-son she used to love
She slew that dear, defenceless dove
For mother, in my broken youth
Was widow, torn by tragic truth