Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE LITTLE GIRL THAT MOTHER USED TO BE, by NANCY BYRD TURNER


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE LITTLE GIRL THAT MOTHER USED TO BE, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: When we travel back in summer to the old house by the sea
Last Line: I'd rather have her, anyway, than the girl she used to be.
Subject(s): Mothers


WHEN we travel back in summer to the old house by the sea,
Where long ago my mother lived, a little girl like me,
I have the strangest notion that she still is waiting there,
A small child in a pinafore with ribbon on her hair.
I hear her in the garden when I go to pick a rose;
She follows me along the path on dancing tipsy toes;
I hear her in the hayloft when the hay is slippery -- sweet --
A rustle and a scurry and a sound of scampering feet;
Yet though I sit as still as still, she never comes to me,
The funny little laughing girl my mother used to be.
Sometimes I nearly catch her as she dodges here and there,
Her white dress flutters round a tree and flashes up a stair;
Sometimes I almost put my hand upon her apron strings --
Then, just before my fingers close, she's gone again like wings.
A sudden laugh, a scrap of song, a footfall on the lawn,
And yet, no matter how I run, forever up and gone!
A fairy or a firefly could hardly flit so fast.
When we come home in summer, I have given up at last.
I lay my cheek on mother's. If there's only one for me,
I'd rather have her, anyway, than the girl she used to be.





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