This poem expresses love and gratitude towards a heavenly mother figure from the perspective of many living things and people she helps in small and big ways with her kindness, care, empathy and support. It describes how she was loved by servants for her smile, a dog for a bone, sparrows for water, a man for her manners, a toddler she picked up, a cat for milk, a widow for her help, the ground she walked on gently, beggars she fed, orphans she sheltered, and finally by the speaker for bearing and raising them.