Flower of Song 57 



O golden days, O woodland ways, 



And sunny meadows, teeming 



With treasures rare, most royal fare, 



For bard's or lover's dreaming. 



O silvery stream, with glint and gleam 



Where dipping boughs are laving, 



The current lags where sweet Blue Flags 



By ripples stirred are laving. 



Amid the green, their soft, blue sheen, 

 With white and purple penciled, 

 Like bits of sky, where sunbeams lie, 

 Through leafy branches stenciled. 



To Southern skies my fancy flies, 



Beneath whose soft beguiling, 



What songs I sung, when hope was young, 



And all the world was smiling. 



O memories dear, that linger near 



The meadow, brook and wildwood, 



And Blue Flags sweet, that made complete 



The sunny days of childhood. 



W. B. Hunt: Blue Flags. 



Queen of the garden, in splendor unfolding 

 All your rich beauties unto our beholding, 

 Scattering freely your largesse untold; 

 Born in the purple, no rival you're fearing 

 Proudly your head to the sunshine uprearing 

 Gorgeous your raiment of purple and gold. 



