Someone would like to have you for her child
   but you are mine.
 Someone would like to rear you on a costly mat
   but you are mine.
 Someone would like to place you on a camel blanket
   but you are mine.
 I have you to rear on a torn old mat.
 Someone would like to have you as her child
   but you are mine. 

NOTE: I have no specific author or translator information for this poem. (The former may not be surprising as it may be lost to history.) At any rate, my source is Classic Poems to Read Aloud, an anthology selected by James Berry (1995; Kingfisher Publications,) and it was titled “Lullaby.” That book cites a Cambridge University Press volume entitled African Poetry, edited by Ulli Beier, as its source.