SENSITIVE PLANT. 
149 
For the Sensitive Plant has no bright flower 
Radiance and odour are not its dower; 
ft loves, even like Love ; its deep heart is full; 
It desires what it has not, the beautiful! 
The light winds which from unsustaining wings 
Shed the music of many murmurings ; 
The beams which dart from many a star 
Of the flowers whose hues they bear afar; 
The plumed insects swift and free, 
Like golden boats on a sunny sea, 
Laden with light and odour, which pass 
Over the gleam of the living grass; 
The unseen clouds of the dew, which lie 
Like fire in the flowers till the sun rides high, 
Then wander like spirits among the spheres, 
Each cloud faint with the fragrance it bears; 
The quivering vapours of dim noontide, 
Which like a sea o’er the warm earth glide, 
In which every sound, and odour, and beam, 
Move, as reeds in a single stream; 
Each and all like ministering angels were 
For the Sensitive Plant sweet joy to bear, 
Whilst the lagging hours of the day went by 
Like windless clouds o’er a tender sky. 
And when evening descended from heaven above, 
And the earth was all rest, and the air was all love, 
And delight, though less bright, was far more deep, 
And the day’s veil fell from the world of sleep ; 
