Today is my mother’s ninetieth birthday. Below is a poem I wrote twenty years ago, for her seventieth. The poem assumes what needs to be stated outright, which is that my mother is one of the most remarkable women I have ever known. What I owe her will never be repaid, and that is all to the good. It is the way God has fashioned things.
Elizabeth
When sons rise up to call their mother blessed
They simply say what all who know can see,
That mothers fearing God surpass the rest,
And praises must be rendered thankfully.
When women leave the lot apportioned them
To grasp and grab for what is not their own
They leave behind a trail of damaged men
Whose wounds don’t bleed until they’ve fully grown.
But those who teach, rebuke, instruct and spank
Prepare their sons to fight whom they could not
And so a grateful church has God to thank
For victories of grace by proxy fought.
And so I thank our ruling God above
For giving us a gracious present of
Elizabeth Catherine Dodds Wilson, 70 years