Grandmother's Quilt Poem by Robert Kirkland Kernighan

There 's an old, old quilt a dear old quilt

A warm old quilt, at home,
As near and dear to my heart to-day

As when I began to roam ;
It covered the new-born baby :

It covered the solemn dead :
It covered me up when I was a boy,

Asleep on Grandmother's bed.

Of patches 't is made, and quaint old pieces

Of Grandmother's dresses are seen ;
And pieces from gowns of her sisters and nieces,

In yellow, and red and green.
There are pieces of silk O, the rare old silk !

And reds ah ! the rare old reds !
And bits of satin as white as milk,

In the quilt on Grand-ma's bed.

There are patterns, odd, that have n't been seen

Since Jaques Cartier was here ;
There are patterns you 'd think that could n't have been-

So comical, quaint and queer.
This is the dress my Grandmother wore,

When she welcomed the heroes who bled
At Queenston Heights : here 's a piece, you see,

In the quilt on Grandmother's bed.

But the patch I love, the dearest of all,
Is a glittering patch of white ;

I never can see it with out a pang
Yet mixed with a strange delight.

'T is a piece of the gown that my Mother wore,
When she to the altar was led ;

It 's the sweetest patch of them all, I think,
In the quilt on Grandmother's bed.

'T was Grandmother's bed it 's Mother's bed ;

And Grand-ma's long gone home :
She called me and kissed me before she died,

And warned me never to roam.
One wish I would to my friends bequeath,

When I my race have sped :
Just lay me down for an hour beneath

The quilt on Grandmother's bed.j