Mother's Day 2019: Words and Art Honouring Mums
MOTHER’S DAY, SUNDAY 31 MARCH
“母の日
haha no hi”
Mother’s Day in Ireland has been celebrated for generations - ‘Mothering Sunday’ or Mother's Day is always on the fourth Sunday of Lent in Ireland and the UK. In the USA and other countries, including Japan, it is celebrated on the second Sunday in May (this year, that is Sunday, 12 May). The earliest celebrations began in BC-era Rome, honouring the goddess Cybele, and the tradition later spread and adapted throughout Europe.
While originally associated with European culture, Mother’s Day is widely celebrated in Japan, first occurring on 6th March, or the birthday of Empress Kojun, and later established on the second Sunday of May in post-WWII Japan.
“Mother and Child,” painting on paper, Shinsui Ito (1898-1972)
1. MY MOTHER'S EYES
In the evening
when I open my eyes
I think of my mother in my hometown far away,
also opening her eyes and saying, “O my sweet child.”
Jūkichi Yagi (japanese poet, 1928)
2. Song Of The Old Mother
I rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow
Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow;
And then I must scrub and bake and sweep
Till stars are beginning to blink and peep;
And the young lie long and dream in their bed
Of the matching of ribbons for bosom and head,
And their days go over in idleness,
And they sigh if the wind but lift a tress:
While I must work because I am old,
And the seed of the fire gets feeble and cold.
William Butler Yeats (Irish poet, 1865 – 1939)
“Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world, a mother’s love is not.”
Mother and Child on the Shore off an Irish lough (Oil on board), by Sine Mackinnon (1901–1997)
3. MORNING SONG [EXCERPT]
“Mother and Child,” Gustav Klimt (1905)
I’m no more your mother
Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow
Effacement at the wind’s hand.
All night your moth-breath
Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:
A far sea moves in my ear.
One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral
In my Victorian nightgown.
Your mouth opens clean as a cat’s.
Sylvia Plath (american poet, 1932 - 1963)
CELEBRATE WHO SHE IS - with YAMAMORI
Mother’s Day at Yamamori is a special one for us, so we want to share it with you and your mum! Enter our competition to win a meal for yourself and your mum - ends Friday, March 29 at 5pm. Or, the perfect way to say thank you is with a Yamamori gift card - available for all occasions!
“お母さん、いつもありがとう。
Okaasan itsumo arigatou.”
