POETRY OF FLOWERS. 207 
bh The hand that plucked thee, years ago, 
Is cold and lifeless now ; 
lost Yet for her sake who sleeps in death, 
How dear to me art thou, 
Sweet relic of the past ! 
Thy tinted petals wither’d lie, 
Thy beauty now hath fied, 
en, Like those fond hopes which, mournfully, 
0M: I buried with the dead ; 
What has been is thy all in all; 
What és is nought to thee; 
Hy For though it never may return, 
Ilow sweet to memory 
Are visions of the past! 



and And yet thy gay career was not 
All sunshine, joy, and rest; 
, She pluck’d thee when a raindrop lay 
8) And glisten’d on thy breast ; 
And thus will I recail the joys 
Of many a bygone year ; 
On my heart’s memory there lies 
A large and heavy tear— 
Love’s tribute of the past, 





