Wong, Janet. 1999. The rainbow hand: poems about mothers and children. New York: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing. ISBN: 0-689-82148-4.
Introduction
In this poem a daughter worries that her mother won't like her Mother's Day gift just because it didn't come from a store and it wasn't wrapped in a fancy box.
Mother's Day
Mother's Day morning
and I have no present.
No money.
I walk outside.
Kicking the dirt,
my toe hits a rock.
A smooth speckled oval,
it could be a gargoyle egg.
Or a paperweight.
Stuck in a box,
wrapped in the gold paper
Mother saved from Christmas,
the old tape peeled off,
it looks like a good gift.
She shakes the box, smiling,
while I stare at her hands
untying the ribbon,
tearing the paper
lifting the lid.
She holds the rock with flat fingers,
like some rotten egg.
Mother walks into the kitchen,
puzzling. She puts a clove of garlic
on her thick round cutting board
and brings the rock down hard.
"A garlic rock," she says,
pulling chunks of garlic
from the broken skin.
"Just what I needed."
Extension
Have students make homemade gifts and/or cards for Mother's Day.
Five Poems