My Strength Renewed, My Rock

On the day of July nine In the year of ninety and six. Her heart was so pure and so fine But too weak for the surgeon to fix. Her eyes still shown bright as day But her frail body had wasted away Her smile as warm as the love That she gave through Jesus above She knew she would not pull through But not one moment of sadness or blue Did she cast to her loved ones there Who waited and prayed for her care The Day was the twelfth of July The hours ticked endlessly by Many friends and family too People I never knew Came to say their farewells To a sister who with Jesus now sails On a peaceful and gentle tide To ever abide at his side As the service came to a close And the time was as everyone knows To cover her body with earth Though her spirit had now a new birth From out of the crowd stepped a child Who's heart like her grandmother's was mild She picked up a shovel and prayed As everyone stood there dismayed Some tried to keep her from her task She looked to her Grandpa with eyes that ask He said to those who had tried To stop this child at the side Of her grandmother's still open grave With shovel in hand and heart so brave Let her be was his reply She's strong enough I won't deny She then began her chosen task Permitted to do what her heart had ask Shovel by shovel and tear by tear Her respect paid true to a lady so dear At the tender young age of only ten This little girl whose life has been Directed and sculpted by the events of that day And by the grandmother who taught her to pray Just ten precious years she shared with her here But forever in her heart her grandmother is near I am the mother of this brave little child And never has any heart been so mild The day was the twelfth of July And to my Mother I said good bye A new strength was shown to me that day In the child I had birthed and taught to play Grandmother's shoes are not easy to fill But with a heart of gold and the strength and will She to this day has been my best friend In absence of Mother my rock to the end Now twelve years later a woman full grown No longer here with me, elsewhere on her own No matter the distance in miles or in time She still fills the shoes of that Mother so fine And knowing her task will never be done She looks to the Heaven's, The Father, The Son But also she looks for a glimpse now and then From the Grandmother she knows will hold her again