THE POESY OF FLOWERS 243 



TO THE HOUSTONIA CERULEA. 



How often, modest flower, 

 I mark thy tender blossoms, where they spread 

 Along the turfy slope, their starry bed, 



Hung with the heavy shower. 



Thou comest in the dawn 

 Of Nature's promise, when the sod of May 

 Is speckled with its earliest array, 



And strewest with bloom the lawn. 



'T is but a few brief days, 

 1 saw the green hill in its fold of snow; 

 Hut now thy slender stems arise and blow. 



In April's fitful rays. 



I love thoe, delicate 



And humble as thou art; thy dress of white, 

 And hliio, uud all the tints where these unite, 



Or wrapped in spiral plait. 



Or to the glancing sun, 



Shining through checkered cloud, and dewy shower, 

 Unfolding thy fair cross. Yes, tender flower, 



Thy blended colors run, 



And meet in harmony, 



Commingling like tHe rainbow tints; thy urn 

 Of yellow rises with a graceful turn, 



And as a golden eye, 



Its softly swelling throat 

 Shines in the centre of thy circle, where 

 Thy downy stigma rises slim and fair, 



And catches, as they float, 



A cloud of living air, 

 The atom seeds of fertilizing dust, 

 That hover, as thy lurking anthers burst. 



And O! how purely there 



