Ballad Of The Harp Weaver

Son, said my mother

When I was knee-high

You've need of clothes to cover you

And not a rag have I

There's nothing in the house

To make a boy breeches

Nor shears to cut a cloth with

Nor thread to take stitches

There's nothing in the house

But a loaf-end of rye

And a harp with a woman's head

Nobody will buy

And she began to cry

That was in the early fall

When came the late fall

Son, she said, the sight of you

Makes your mother's blood crawl

Little skinny shoulder-blades

Sticking through your clothes!

And where you'll get a jacket from

God above knows

It's lucky for me, lad

Your daddy's in the ground

And can't see the way I let

His son go around!

And she made a queer sound

That was in the late fall

When the winter came

I'd not a pair of breeches

Nor a shirt to my name

I couldn't go to school

Or out of doors to play

And all the other little boys

Passed our way

Son, said my mother

Come, climb into my lap

And I'll chafe your little bones

While you take a nap

And, oh, but we were silly

For half an hour or more

Me with my long legs

Dragging on the floor

A-rock-rock-rocking

To a mother-goose rhyme!

Oh, but we were happy

For half an hour's time!

But there was I, a great boy

And what would folks say

To hear my mother singing me

To sleep all day

In such a daft way?

Men say the winter

Was bad that year

Fuel was scarce

And food was dear

A wind with a wolf's head

Howled about our door

And we burned up the chairs

And sat upon the floor

All that was left us

Was a chair we couldn't break

And the harp with a woman's head

Nobody would take

For song or pity's sake

The night before Christmas

I cried with cold

I cried myself to sleep

Like a two-year old

And in the deep night

I felt my mother rise

And stare down upon me

With love in her eyes

I saw my mother sitting

On the one good chair

A light falling on her

From I couldn't tell where

Looking nineteen

And not a day older

And the harp with a woman's head

Leaned against her shoulder

Her thin fingers, moving

In the thin, tall strings

Were weav-weav-weaving

Wonderful things

Many bright threads

From where I couldn't see

Were running through the harp-strings

Rapidly

And gold threads whistling

Through my mother's hand

I saw the web grow

And the pattern expand

She wove a child's jacket

And when it was done

She laid it on the floor

And wove another one

She wove a red cloak

So regal to see

She's made it for a king's son

I said

And not for me

But I knew it was for me

She wove a pair of breeches

Quicker than that!

She wove a pair of boots

And a little cocked hat

She wove a pair of mittens

She wove a little blouse

She wove all night

In the still, cold house

She sang as she worked

And the harp-strings spoke

Her voice never faltered

And the thread never broke

And when I awoke

There sat my mother

With the harp against her shoulder

Looking nineteen

And not a day older

A smile about her lips

And a light about her head

And her hands in the harp-strings

Frozen dead

And piled beside her

And toppling to the skies

Were the clothes of a king's son

Just my size