‘My dearest Mother’

“Do not be sad my darling”
my dearest Mother sighed to me
“Is it because your lover’s gone
sailing on yon salty sea ?”

“He’s only away a’working
so will come back to ye’
when he has served his King & country in the Royal Navy”

As I wiped a falling teardrop 
with my Mother’s apron strings
I glimpsed into my future
wondering why she said those things

When she turned to me with such concern
spilling from her eyes
My Mother, my faithful friend
I could not tell her lies

So as we sat together 
sipping from a pot of tea
I told her I had met another
who asked to marry me

“Oh my pretty daughter”
my wise Mother did reply
“Surely your sailorboy
is where thy heart should lie”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder
He said he’d slave for thee
then haste back on his return
when he would marry ye’

“Alas,” I looked into my Mother’s eyes 
I had to tell the truth
tho my disguise had served me well
what was hidden showed the proof

A penny dropped without a word within my Mother’s mind
and all at once she said to me
“Oh my child I must be blind”

My cloak no longer fitted
I had to let-out my frock
I’d held a secret within my heart
Cradled underneath my smock

“Accept the hand of marriage from another” was her reply
“Yon sailorboy shall be no more
without a question why”