Name/Title
AU Lambert, Elsie Pauline [Warfel] - 1934-11-13 poem, 'Meditation of a Mother...'Entry/Object ID
2004.1.12Scope and Content
This was transcribed from a photo copy of a typescript. Pauline gave no indication of the source for her piece as to whether it was written notes by her mother or she imagined the whole thing in her mind.Context
Pauline L. Warfel
Nov. 13, 1934
For aunt Caroline Lambert Charles' birthday. She was born Nov. 13, 1877.
At this time she was in a nursing home in Westerville, O.
She had broken her hip and had to be cared for there. She had a birthday party at the table at this time. She later died in the same nursing home and was buried beside her husband Oscar in the Otterbein Cemetery. Many relatives attended her funeral but I was not there.
Daniel Webster Lambert was a preacher in the United Brethren Church and had a circuit consisting of several churches part of the time.
This is the meditation of Deborah Vernon Embree Lambert mother of 10.
"Meditation of Mother Who is to Have a Child in Mid November a Long Time Ago "
"October has slipped away into November this day.
I have loved this October more than most,
And more than before I have sat in the sun
To rest before the baby comes."
"This autumn the colors have rivaled a palette,
of that painter from New York
Who paints our peaceful valleys
And our rolling hills."
"My older daughters are in my kitchen
And my sons bring in the cows and farm the land,
And I rest before the birth of this small soul."
"My husband wends his way along the country roads
Preaching the gospel and bringing in new souls in Christ,
But he will be here to welcome this new child."
"His blue eyes will smile, and he will
Clasp his baby in his arms,
A person softened as the years have gone along."
"These younger children will be companions
And listeners, and make him happy too,
For he has learned the art of children
And is not so stern with them as with the others."
"I hope it is a girl for girls ever warm the hearts
Of older people and bless the day that they were born,
And bring their children home to visit and be blessed."
"Perhaps she will be bright and write these stories
I have longed to write and compose the poems
Better than my own."
"But most of all I hope she will be a gracious one and pretty
And beloved of a good and worthy man,
Her equal in knowledge and the soul."
"My, I have dropped my knitting
And the little robe is not yet finished.
Like it was before, I am almost helpless
To retrieve it too."
"I am so glad the little coat is white
And the yarn so soft this time.
The sheep we took it from ware better than the others."
"No, kitty, do not tangle it. Here's your string."
"Little Bertha, won't you get the yarn for mother."
"That's a dear."
"Come stand by me or get the little chair
And I will tell you a story."
"You may bring Ottie too but he's too small to listen much."
"I'll let him sit beside me here and put my arms around him.
And love him as a baby should be loved once more.
Little enough he will be babied after the new
One comes....and he will miss it."
"Once upon a time, a long time ago
Way off in the country called France,
My great, great, grandfather lived."
"He was a good man but not a Catholic
A Quaker. . . . like your grandfather and grandmother dear"
"But in France most were Catholics and did
not like the Quakers.
So they gathered their trunks together
And came on a big boat to a place
Called Philadelphia . . . . way off east in our own country."
And her voice went on until the children grew tired
And little Ottie wet to sleep
And the sun crept around the corner
Of the house and she had to go inside.
Beside the fire she sat and counted the stitches
In the little coat and the days on the calendar
That hung beside the schoolmaster's desk
In the sitting room.
Bertha played quietly with her corn husk doll
And little sturdy Ottie slept on the horsehair sofa
Relaxed and peaceful paying no attention
To its hardness in his sturdy healthy little boy way.
November 12th
"Another day has come and it must be near my time.
It's not so warm today and it's better by the fire.
But they are keeping the near bedroom heated for me too
. . . . for often now I take a nap."
"Ida has taken Ottie to my brother's house
And Bertha is at Reese Lambert's.
I miss those little ones but Ida and Eva
Have much to do to watch them."
"Dear God, help me to bear the pain . . .
And know that it will soon be over.
It must not be today for it is evening now."
"Daniel, is that you? Alas, 'tis now . . .
You are just in time to be with me."
"Deborah, my dear . . . here is your little girl"
"What do you want to call her? She is very fair."
"A girl you say. God bless the tiny mite.
I'll call her Caroline."
"What time is it?"
"It's on in the night and the twelfth no more."
The Bible record says,
"Born hereupon this farm, a girl,
Daughter of Daniel Webster Lambert and Doborah
Embree Lambert.
And her name is Caroline Deborah, her mother named her Caroline
But her father honored Deborah with the other part."
A faded note in her mother's hand says:
"She is very fair with light curly hair
And deep blue eyes and she looks like Daniel.
I think she is the answer to my prayer."
