Floral Poetry and the Language of Flowers/Hymn to the Flowers
HYMN TO THE FLOWERS.
Day-stars! that ope your eyes with man, to twinkleFrom rainbow galaxies of earth's creation,And dew-drops on her holy altars sprinkleAs a libation.
Ye matin worshippers! who, bending lowlyBefore the uprisen sun, God's lidless eye!Throw from your chalices a sweet and holyIncense on high.
Ye bright Mosaics that with storied beautyThe floor of Nature's temple tesselateWith numerous emblems of instructive dutyYour forms create.
'Neath cloistered boughs, each floral bell that swingeth,And tolls its perfume on the passing air,Makes Sabbath in the fields, and ever ringethA call to prayer.
Not to the domes where crumbling arch and columnAttest the feebleness of mortal hand,But to that fane, most catholic and solemn,Which God hath planned.
To that cathedral, boundless as our wonder,Whose quenchless lamps the sun and moon supply;Its choir the winds and waves—its organ thunder—Its dome the sky.
There, as in solitude and shade I wander,Through the green aisles, or stretched upon the sod,Awed by the silence, reverently ponderThe ways of God.
Your voiceless lips, O flowers! are living preachers,Each cup a pulpit, and each leaf a book,Supplying to my fancy numerous teachersFrom loneliest nook.
Floral apostles! that in dewy splendour,"Weep without woe, and blush without a crime,"O may I deeply learn, and ne'er surrenderYour lore sublime!
"Thou wert not, Solomon, in all thy glory,Arrayed," the lilies cry, "in robes like ours;How vain your grandeur! ah, how transitoryAre human flowers!"
In the sweet-scented pictures, heavenly Artist!With which thou paintest Nature's widespread hall,What a delightful lesson thou impartestOf love to all!
Not useless are ye, flowers, though made for pleasure,Blooming o'er field and wave by day and night,From every source your sanction bids me treasureHarmless delight.
Ephemeral sages what instructors hoaryFor such a world of thought could furnish scope?Each fading calyx a memento mori,Yet fount of hope.
Posthumous glories! angel-like collection!Upraised from seed or bulb interred in earth,Ye are to me a type of resurrection,A second birth.
Were I, O God, in churchless lands remaining,Far from all voice of teachers or divines,My soul would find, in flowers of thy ordaining,Priests, sermons, shrines!Horace Smith.
