THE FLOWERS 213 



" Because I have parted with stem and blade ! 



But under the ground 



I am safe and sound, 



With the snow's thick blanket over me laid. 

 I'm all alive and ready to shoot, 



Should the spring of the year 



Come dancing here 

 But I pity the flower without branch or root." 



" You think I am dead," 



A soft voice said, 



" Because not a branch or a root I own ! 

 I never have died, 

 But close I hide 



In a plumy seed that the wind has sown. 

 Patient I wait through the long winter hours, 

 You will see me again 

 I shall laugh at you then, 

 Out of the eyes of a hundred flowers." 



EDITH M. THOMAS. 



THE FLOWERS 1 



ALL the names I know from nurse : 

 Gardener's garters, Shepherd's purse, 

 Bachelor's buttons, Lady's smock, 

 And the Lady Hollyhock. 



Fairy places, fairy things, 



Fairy woods where the wild bee wings, 



1 From Poems and Ballads; copyright, 1895, 1896, by 

 Charles Scribner's Sons. 



