To the Editor:

Mothers of the world deserve praise and gratitude for all that they do to build a better global community.

This poem celebrates all mothers on Mother’s Day. We need them now more than ever to help the human spirit triumph.

Happy Mother’s Day!
 

Mothers of the World

     let your children have some freedom

let them fly kites so that they may look toward Heaven for beauty

and have the wind push them to follow

it’s true that running is good exercise

but what about their innocence

when you watch them ride bicycles

they fall hard and they get up

and keep trying until they then ride fast

kissing the wind as they move without peddling

they understand their fast living and fast automobiles

and remain grateful to you for their first experiences

fraught with danger and sometimes bad luck

they will grow from excruciating pain

they will know what high school teaches

and that first kiss their freshman year

as girls fall in love with them before college

with flirtation and pleas to love them forever

they cry at their wedding after college

     oh mothers you will have to let go

so happiness may be free

to grow their own space

as they make mistakes and

begin flying in airplanes

they will stay connected with you in love

     and if people criticize their success

and their new motorcycles and palatial home

instead of praising them for working hard

     and staying loyal in their bedrooms

you would have loved unconditionally

protecting them from pain and sorrow

     it’s unforgivable to stop loving

so don’t cry when they fly and don’t always take our advice

     and the family splinters sometimes

and your children get old and feeble in assisted living

watching movies of children flying kites

and riding bicycles and racing automobiles

and flying in airplanes

doing what you did when you were young and free.
 

Leonard A. Slade Jr.

Albany

Editor’s note: Dr. Leonard A. Slade Jr., professor emeritus of Africana studies and English at the University at Albany, has written 23 books of poetry. 

He is a SUNY Citizen Academic Laureate, Poet Laureate of The Southern Conference on African American Studies, Poet Fellow of The Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing, The Edmund J. James Scholar in English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, member of Sigma Tau Delta International English Honor Society, SUNY Collins Fellow, member of The Academy of American Poets, member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, and was accepted at Yale University for Summer Study in 2026.