According to Daisy, this recitation was about another girl in town.
So this is New Year’s Eve Mother. Ah Mother, can it be?
And what a sad sad change, Mother, this year has wrought in me.
Last year there was no merrier heart. There was no brighter eyes than mine.
There was no lighter step. Now mother what am I?
A theme for every idle jest, sunk lower than the slave.
With a blighted name and a broken heart, and very near my grave.
For I feel that my day is numbered, may sand is running fast,
And the thought is strong within me, that this day is my last.
Of a group of lads and lassies, me thinks I catch a glance,
My old companions will be there, just high’n to the dance.
And they will spend the night away in noisy mirth and glee,
While the shelter of a prison cell alone remains for me.
I remember last year’s sleigh ride, Mother, over the frozen snow
And how we danced till daylight and the sky was all aglow.
I was the lightest heart of one of all that merry throng
And he was by my side, Mother, whom I had loved so long.
I know you often warned me Mother, and told me of the truth.
How village maids were seldom wed by high and lofty youth.
But I thought me of the tales I’d read and of the songs I’d sung,
How village maids are often wed when beautiful and young.
So I prized too much my beauty which has fully been my deign,
And scorned the poor but honest ones that offered me their name.
And now they will not speak to me, I am a thing so vile.
They pass me with a meaning look orr with a mocking smile.
Tis very hard and it is sad, but this I know
If they had borne what I had borne, I wouldn’t treat them so.
For I am bowed in deep disgrace by one I love beguiled.
He’s left me in my shame alone and he will not own his child.
But even now I do not think as hard of him as many others do.
I know he done me bitter wrong and bowed my head in shame.
And yet it wasn’t all his fault. I might have been to blame.
And the time will come when he will feel, his need to be forgiven.
And you’ll forgive him then, dear Mother, when I have gone to Heaven.
Poor babe, she has her father’s face, his bright and laughing eyes
Had she a right to bear his name, how happy I could die.
But if she’s like me, Mother, a bit wayward, a bit wild,
Though it is a bitter legacy to leave a guiless child.
But tell her all of my stories, though she thinks of me with hate.
Better to scorn her mother’s name than to share her mother’s fate.
And you will keep my babe, Mother, and rear her as your own.
Ah, oh, may she repay you, better than I have done.
And now goodbye my Mother, for I know that ere the sun
Shed its first rays tomorrow morn, my journey will be done.
But do not grieve for me, Mother, when I have left you here
For within a peaceful dwelling house will dawn my New Year.