THE CHARM OF GARDENS 



LOVE-LIES-BLEEDING. 



You call it " Love-lies-Bleeding " — so you may, 

 Though the red Flower, not prostrate, only droops 

 As we have seen it here from day to day, 

 From month to month, life passing not away : 

 A flower how rich in sadness ! Even thus stoops, 

 (Sentient by Grecian sculpture's marvellous power) 

 Thus leans, with hanging brow and body bent 

 Earthward in uncomplaining languishment, 

 The dying Gladiator. So, sad Flower ! 

 ('Tis Fancy guides me, willing to be led 

 Though by a slender thread) 

 So drooped Adonis bathed in sanguine dew 

 Of his death-wound, when he from innocent air 

 The gentlest breath of resignation drew ; 

 While Venus in a passion of despair 

 Rent, weeping over him, her golden hair 

 Spangled with drops of that celestial shower. 

 She suffered, as Immortals sometimes do ; 

 But pangs more lasting far that Lover knew 

 Who first, weighed down by scorn, in some lone bower 

 Did press this semblance of unpitied smart 

 Into the service of his constant heart, 

 His own dejection, downcast Flower ! could share 

 With thine, and gave the mournful name 

 Which thou wilt ever bear. 



Then again, Mrs. Browning, who loved Nature and 

 England, and spoke her love in such delicate fancies, 

 writes of flowers in " Our Gardened England," in a poem 

 called, 



A FLOWER IN A LETTER. 



Red Roses, used to praises long, 

 Contented with the poet's song, 



The nightingale's being over ; 

 And Lilies white, prepared to touch 

 The whitest thought, nor soil it much, 



Of dreamer turned to lover. 

 62 



