Happy Indonesia Mother's Day (December 22nd)

A mother's love determines how
We love ourselves and others.
There is no sky we'll ever see
Not lit by that first love.

Stripped of love, the universe
Would drive us mad with pain;
But we are born into a world
That greets our cries with joy.

How much I owe you for the kiss
That told me who I was!
The greatest gift--a love of life--
Lay laughing in your eyes.

Because of you my world still has
The soft grace of your smile;
And every wind of fortune bears
The scent of your caress.

(Turlough O'Carolan)


For all that you have given me,
I can return but love. For you
Bound up the wounds I did not see
And gave me hopes and passions new.

I can return but love for you,
Whose unmoved faith my heart did move,
And gave me hopes and passions new,
And loved me till I turned to love.

Whose unmoved faith did my heart move?
The mother of my heart, not blood,
Who loved me till I turned to love.
And I became the soul I would.

The mother of my heart, not blood,
Bound up the wounds I did not see.
And I became the soul I would
For all that you have given me.

(Dimitri Shostakovich)

Happy Mother's Day to my dear Mum,
Author of my personality:
Pleased, I hope, with what you read in me;
Pleased, I hope, with episodes to come.
Yet now I, too, would get some pleasure from
Making you the book in which I see,
Of all the players in my family,
The central character, whom I would plumb.
How beautiful to move in that direction!
Each to each a separate source of pleasure,
Reading in the other's happiness,
in much description, underlying love.
So would we deepen the connection,
Discovering new passages to treasure
As we follow time towards tenderness,
Yearning for what years unread will prove.

(J. S. Bach)