A Mother’s Love

My response to Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie B&P’s Shadorma and Beyond – Madrigal

This week Bastet has treated us to a mini history of Italian poetry and introduced us to the Italian madrigal, a pastoral or love song written in lines of seven or eleven syllables and consisting of two or three tercets followed by one or two rhyming couplets. Often these poems present fantastic images of animals or birds, symbolic of men or women in pursuit of love and, according to the Italian texts, sometimes the poems were put to music or sung. Bastet has given us an image to inspire us to write our own madrigale.

Mother and Kittens in a Garden, attributed to Mao 1, Chinese, 12th century

Early morning dewdrops shine

On scented rose and grapevine

(Innocence of kitten’s play)

Scratching under hedge and tree

Flinging bits of twig and leaves

(Fledgeling birds greet a new day)

Mother cat and bird close by

Keep watch with a careful eye

Mothers give their love for free

Protect their children fiercely

© Kim M. Russell, 2016