Floral Poetry. 
HYMN TO THE FLOWERS. 
D AY-STARS ! that ope your eyes with man, to twinkle 
From rainbow galaxies of earth’s creation, 
And dew-drops on her holy altars sprinkle 
As a libation. 
Ye matin worshippers ! who, bending lowly 
Before the uprisen sun, God’s lidless eye ! 
Throw from your chalices a sweet and holy 
Incense on high. 
Ye bright Mosaics ! that with storied beauty 
The floor of Nature’s temple tesselate 
With numerous emblems of instructive duty 
Your forms create. 
’Neath cloistered boughs, each floral bell that swingeth, 
And tolls its perfume on the passing air, 
Makes Sabbath in the fields, -and ever ringeth 
A call to prayer. 
Not to the domes where crumbling arch and column 
Attest the feebleness of mortal hand, 
But to that fane, most catholic and solemn, 
Which God hath planned. 
To that cathedral, boundless as our wonder, 
Whose quenchless lamps the sun and moon supply; 
Its choir the winds and waves—its organ thunder— 
Its dome the sky. 
