My faultless friends, the plants and flowers,
Have only smiles for me.
When drought withholds refreshing showers,
Through hot and dreary summer hours,
They then droop silently.
When tired and worn with worldly care,
Their fragrance seems like praise,
A benediction in the air;
Pure as an unfallen angel's prayer,
Sweet'ning the saddest days.
No frowns, no pouting, no complaints,
In my bright garden fair,
A colony of sinless saints,
Whose beauty Nature's pencil paints,
Are my fair darlings there.
No inattention can awake
Envy or jealousy;
Their alabaster boxes break,
As Mary's did, and I partake
Of their rich fragrancy.
Sometimes with weary soul and sad,
I taste their sweet perfume;
And then my soul is very glad,
I feel ashamed I ever had
A hateful sense of gloom.
Flowers are the sylvan syllables,
In colors like the bow,
And wise is he who wisely spells
The blossomed words where beauty dwells,
In purple, gold and snow.
O! sacred is the use of these
Sweet gifts to mortals given.
Their colors charm, their beauties please,
And every better sense they seize,
And bear our thoughts to Heaven.
George W. Bungay.