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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


A MOTHER'S CALL by ELIZA KEARY

First Line: COME BACK, SONS, OVER THE SEA!
Last Line: SLOW, SURE, COMPLETE!
Subject(s): MOTHERS;

COME back, sons, over the sea!
Strong limbs I bore,
Ye are mine still!
Do you rise, do you move to me?
Do you hear there, across the tossing brine,
Sons? -- for the great seas swell;
I smell the breath of them, I hear the roar of them,
Leaping, tossing, toppling over one another,
Lapping up to the shore,
Lashing the rock -- furies,
What do they come for?
Sires of yours, yearsfull agonies --
Home with a wild lament?
Seas, is it this you bear?
No. But the times that come,
And the thunders I hear,
And the rent wide apart in her garment
That covered us, blinded us, wound us --
Chains ground that bound us,
That gyved us, sword that drank at our heart!

Leap to the rock, waves!
Leap to the land, sons, O braves!
Over graves, upon blood-trodden graves
Plant your feet!
Come, times, God-revenge,
Slow, sure, complete!




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