Oh mother, mother, where is happiness? <br />They took my lover's tallness off to war, <br />Left me lamenting. Now I cannot guess <br />What I can use an empty heart-cup for. <br />He won't be coming back here any more. <br />Some day the war will end, but, oh, I knew <br />When he went walking grandly out that door <br />That my sweet love would have to be untrue. <br />Would have to be untrue. Would have to court <br />Coquettish death, whose impudent and strange <br />Possessive arms and beauty (of a sort) <br />Can make a hard man hesitate--and change. <br />And he will be the one to stammer, "Yes." <br />Oh mother, mother, where is happiness?<br /><br />Gwendolyn Brooks<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-sonnet-ballad/
