MY GARDEN With blossoms, red and white, of fallen May 

 OF DREAMS ^nd Chestnut flowers are strewn — 



So have I heard the cuckoo's parting cry, 



From the wet field, through the vext garden trees 



Come, with the volleying rain and tossing breeze — 



The bloom is gone and with the bloom go I. 



Too quick despairer, wherefore wilt thou go? 



Soon will the high Midsummer's pomps come on, 



Soon will the musk carnations break and swell, 



Soon shall we have gold-dusted Snapdragon, 



Sweet William with his homely cottage smell, 



And Stocks in fragrant blow, 



Roses that down the alleys shine afar, 



And open, jasmine muffled lattices, 



And groups under the dreaming garden trees, 



And the full moon and the white evening star." 



In these lines Matthew Arnold not only 

 gives us a glimpse of an English garden, but 

 strikes the note of a sane and wholesome faith. 



Spring is the budding season. There are 

 flowers of summer and harvests of autumn, 

 yes, and a beauty of winter, of which spring 

 is only the promise. 



There are lots of things in my garden that 

 are not in it really yet, but only planted. They 

 will grow and blossom later. Much is embryonic 

 yet — it is underground, but it is shooting up. 



[76] 



