No spot is mean that they begem;
No nosegay fair that holds them not;
They melt the pride and stir the phlegm
Of lord and churl, in court and cot,
And weave a common diadem
For human brows where'er they grow.
They write all languages of red,
They speak all dialects of snow,
And all the words of gold are said
With fragrant meanings where they blow!
Oh sweetest flowers! Oh flowers divine!
In which God comes so closely down,
We gather from his chosen sign
The tints that cluster in his crown--
The perfume of his breath benign!
Oh sweetest flowers! Oh flowers that hold
The fragrant life of Paradise
For a brief day, shut told in fold,
That we may drink it in a trice,
And drop the empty pink and gold!
Oh sweetest flowers, that have a breath
For every passion that we feel!
That tell us what the Master saith
Of blessing, in our woe and weal,
And all events of life and death!
IV.
The time of roses came again;
And one had bloomed within the manse,
Bloomed in a burst of midnight pain,
And plumed its life in fair expanse,
Beneath love's nursing sun and rain.
In calyx fair of lilied lawn,
Wrapped in the mosses of the lamb,
Long days it lightened toward the dawn
Of the bright-blushing oriflamme,
That on two happy faces shone.
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