Unpitying frosts, and Autumn's power From morning suns and evening dews 1786. Philip Freneau. TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN THOU blossom bright with autumn dew, Thou comest not when violets lean 18 24 Thou waitest late and com'st alone, And frosts and shortening days portend 12 Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye 16 I would that thus, when I shall see 1832 William Cullen Bryant. 20 THE RHODORA ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWER In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes, 10 This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, But, in my simple ignorance, suppose The self-same Power that brought me there brought you. 1839. Ralph Waldo Emerson. TO THE DANDELION DEAR common flower, that grow'st beside the way, Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold, Which children pluck, and, full of pride uphold, Which not the rich earth's ample round May match in wealth, thou art more dear to me Than all the prouder summer-blooms may be. 9 Gold such as thine ne'er drew the Spanish prow Of age, to rob the lover's heart of ease; 'T is the Spring's largess, which she scatters now To rich and poor alike, with lavish hand, Though most hearts never understand To take it at God's value, but pass by The offered wealth with unrewarded eye. 18 Thou art my tropics and mine Italy; The eyes thou givest me Are in the heart, and heed not space or time: Not in mid June the golden-cuirassed bee Feels a more Summer-like warm ravishment His fragrant Sybaris, than I, when first Then think I of deep shadows in the grass, The gleaming rushes lean a thousand ways, That from the distance sparkle through move. 36 My childhood's earliest thoughts are linked with thee; The sight of thee calls back the robin's song, Who, from the dark old tree Beside the door, sang clearly all day long, And I, secure in childish piety, Listened as if I heard an angel sing With news from Heaven, which he could bring Fresh every day to my untainted ears When birds and flowers and I were happy peers. How like a prodigal doth nature seem, More sacredly of every human heart, 45 Since each reflects in joy its scanty gleam Did we but pay the love we owe, And with a child's undoubting wisdom look James Russell Lowell. 54 THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS THE melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sear. Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead; They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread; The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay, And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day. Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang and stood In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood? Alas! they all are in their graves, the gentle race of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours. |