Mother Mary Love

Just months after their father’s death, Evelyn, Rose and their mother appear on the 1910 Census in Cleveland Ward 1, Cuyahoga Co, Ohio, living with the maternal grandmother Irene Cooney and several of Mary’s grown brothers. Irene had been born in Ireland and immigrated to the US in 1870.

Mary lived to see both her daughters graduate from St. Colman’s High School and enter adulthood.

By 1930 they were still in Cleveland but in a rented place they shared with a Czech family. Evelyn was working as a stenographer and Rose as a book keeper.

Again from the 1978 letter, Evelyn spoke of her mother:

I don't know the year of Mama's birth, but the day was March 18, and I celebrate it with love and thanksgiving.

She was a glorious creative human being and though her education was limited, she had a high artistic sense and a sublime sense of humor. I marvel at her courage and selflessness. I have been told by friends who knew her as a young woman that she was outstanding for the beauty of her costumes and won many awards for them (all of which she made herself).

When Rose and I came into being, she re-directed all her attention to us: she worked, among other ways, as a dress maker to provide us with every good thing. Many nights, I've been told, she bounced one of us on her knee as she pedaled the sewing machine.

We were always beautifully dressed. She shopped at the "best" stores on month-end, bought large coats, etc, and made them into two. I remember one such triumph: a shocking pink that she decorated with black plush, and Rose and I were old enough to enjoy the compliments we received everywhere we went.

When the mother died two years after Rose’s death, Evelyn was all alone in the world. She wrote at least two poems to her mother’s memory:

Hands of a Mother

Three things I notice in the shadows:

Death is upon her hands.

They are still and white:

But the gold of her wedding ring

Is alive and gleaming

Beneath the folded heart,

And the cross of her rosary is shining

Like a starry dart.

Three candles burn,

Sighing with a blue murmur.

Gone is the dear blood from her fingers,

But the work-darkened scars remain,

With the glow of love’s gold pattern

On her left hand

And the Sign of the Cross

On her right.

The ring is my cradle;

The Cross my tomb.

There in the flame-light lies my destiny,

Where death is.

Evelyn Coffey

Mother’s Picture

Her place is there . . . . .

She of silver hair . . . . .

Elevated in light,

In candlelight!

Touch the flowers

With orchid hours

For her to wear.

Spin pale lace

To frame her face;

Lay bare the wall.

Her place is there . . . . .

When shadows fall . . . . .

In candlelight!

Evelyn Coffey