IN the sorrow and the terror of the nations, 
In a world shaken through by lamentations, 
 Shall I dare know happiness 
 That I stitch a baby?s dress? 
 
So: for I shall be a mother with the mothers, 
I shall know the mother?s anguish like the others, 
 Present joy must surely start 
 For the life beneath my heart. 
 
Gods and men, ye know a woman?s glad unreason, 
How she cannot bend and weep but in her season, 
 Let my hours with rapture glow 
 As the seams and stitches grow. 
 
And I cannot hear the word of fire and slaughter; 
Do men die? Then live, my child, my son, my daughter! 
 Into realms of pain I bring 
 You for joy?s own offering.