ON RECEIVING A BUNCH OF HEATHER, GORSE, AND FERN.
Wild blossoms of the moorland, ye are very dear to me;
Ye lure my dreaming memory as clover does the bee;
Ye bring back all my childhood loved, when Freedom, Joy, and Health
Had never thought of weaving chains to fetter Fame and Wealth.
Wild blossoms of the common land, brave tenants of the earth,
Your breathings were among the first that help'd my spirit's birth;
For how my busy brain would dream, and how my heart would burn,
Where gorse and heather flung their arms above the forest fern.
Ye lure my dreaming memory as clover does the bee;
Ye bring back all my childhood loved, when Freedom, Joy, and Health
Had never thought of weaving chains to fetter Fame and Wealth.
Wild blossoms of the common land, brave tenants of the earth,
Your breathings were among the first that help'd my spirit's birth;
For how my busy brain would dream, and how my heart would burn,
Where gorse and heather flung their arms above the forest fern.
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