Song For a Fifth Child

We've all heard the little poem:
"So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.

I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep."

My sweet daughter Molly even made me a beautiful wooden plaque with this verse! Today, I learned a little more about the poem and it was fun to realize the similarities between our families.  The poem is entitled "Song for a Fifth Child" and it was written by Ruth Hulburt Hamilton. Ruth was the mother of four children, all two years apart.  In 1957, when her youngest child was five years old, she gave birth to her daughter Jane.  Ruth explained,

“The children were all older when Jane was born and they would rush home to see her and hold her. Since there were five years between my next youngest and Jane, I had a bit more quiet time with her.”

I have an similar, but even larger space of fourteen years, between my youngest son and my fifth child. And like Ruth Hamilton, I was blessed with a little girl whom we often call by her middle name, Jane. After raising four children I knew that babies "don't keep," so I took full advantage of  Lavender's babyhood.  I spent many hours holding and rocking her and I let certain things go.  Now I am paying the price by having to catch up on deep cleaning and other projects like cleaning the garage, but it was worth it!  I am grateful for the many hours I was able to spend rocking my sweet baby.  I still love the quiet time we have together each morning when she wakes up and each night before I put her to bed.

Oh, and by the way, there is a whole lot more to the poem!

Song For a Fifth Child
by Ruth Hulburt Hamilton

Mother, O Mother, come shake out your cloth,
Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
Hang out the washing, make up the bed,
Sew on a button and butter the bread.
Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She’s up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I’ve grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue,
(Lullabye, rockabye, lullabye loo.)
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(Pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo.)
The shopping’s not done and there’s nothing for stew
And out in the yard there’s a hullabaloo
But I’m playing Kanga and this is my Roo
Look! Aren’t her eyes the most wonderful hue?
(Lullabye, rockaby lullabye loo.)

The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
But children grow up as I’ve learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep