32 THE POETRY OF FLOWERS. 
When winter had gone and spring came back, 
The sensitive-plant was a leafless wreck; 
But the mandrakes, and toadstools, and docks* 
and: darnels, 
Rose like the dead from their buried charnels. 
CONCLUSION. 
Whether the sensitive plant, or that 
Which within its boughs like a spirit sat, 
Ere its outward form had known decay, 
Now felt this change, I cannot say. 
.Whether that lady’s gentle mind, 
No longer with the form combined, 
Which scattei’d love, as stars do light, 
Found sadness where it left delight, 
I dare not guess; but in this life 
Of error, ignorance, and strife, 
Where nothing is, but all things seem, 
And we the shadows of the dream. 
It is a modest creed, and yet 
Pleasant, if one considers it, 
To own that death itself must be, 
Like all the rest, a mockery. 
That garden sweet, that lady fair, 
And all sweet shapes and odours ther© f 
