O Sweet Anemones

By Jessie E. Sampter

This Song is one of a series put into the mouth of a nationalist Pharisee of Jerusalem living through the times of the coming of Jesus to Jerusalem and the later development or perversion of Jesus' ideals by Paul.

O sweet anemones on Sharon's plain,

Light dancing seraphim of sun and rain,

Was he not one of us, was he not ours?

And yet he saved not us, O crimson flowers!

As stars that bloom in heaven, full-bloom and still,

As native stags that leap from hill to hill,

As you, dear blossom-stars, on native plains,

So planted here, with God, our home remains.

I, too, would perish here, where he has died,

But felled by horse and spear, not crucified;

I, man of peace, would pour, O Rock of God,

My freedom or my blood on Zion's sod.

When pagans sweep thy fields with withering blast,

My heart is sanctified to death at last;

Its taste is honey-sweet within my mouth,

For we that drink with God can dread no drouth.

O sweet anemones on Sharon's plain,

A spring shall come for us, to bloom again,—

To God a day, to us a thousand years,—

Who still remembers, lives, refreshed with tears.