Poems (Barrett)/A Flower in a Letter

by Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

A Flower in a Letter.

WRITTEN 1839.

My lonely chamber next the sea,
Is full of many flowers set free
 By summer's earliest duty;
Dear friends upon the garden walk
Might stop amid their fondest talk,
 To pull the least in beauty.

A thousand flowers—each seeming one
That learnt, by gazing on the sun,
 To counterfeit his shining—
Within whose leaves the holy dew
That falls from heaven, hath won anew
 A glory . . . in declining.

Red roses, used to praises long,
Contented with the poet's song,
 The nightingale's being over:
And lilies white, prepared to touch
The whitest thought, nor soil it much,
 Of dreamer turned to lover.

Deep violets you liken to
The kindest eyes that look on you,
 Without a thought disloyal:
And cactuses, a queen might don,
If weary of her golden crown,
 And still appear as royal!

Pansies for ladies all! I wis
That none who wear such brooches, miss
 A jewel in the mirror:
And tulips, children love to stretch
Their fingers down, to feel in each
 Its beauty's secret nearer.

Love's language may be talked with these!
To work out choicest sentences,
 No blossoms can be meeter,—
And, such being used in Eastern bowers,
Young maids may wonder if the flowers
 Or meanings be the sweeter.

And such being strewn before a bride,
Her little foot may turn aside,
 Their longer bloom decreeing!
Unless some voice's whispered sound
Should make her gaze upon the ground
 Too earnestly—for seeing.

And such being scattered on a grave,
Whoever mourneth there may have
 A type that seemeth worthy
Of a fair body hid below,
Which bloomed on earth a time ago,
 Then perished as the earthy.

And such being wreathed for worldly feast,
Across the brimming cup some guest
 Their rainbow colours viewing,
May feel them,—with a silent start,—
The covenant, his childish heart
 With nature, made,—renewing.

No flowers our gardened England hath,
To match with these, in bloom and breath,
 Which from the world are hiding
In sunny Devon moist with rills,—
A nunnery of cloistered hills,—
 The elements presiding.

By Loddon's stream the flowers are fair
That meet one gifted lady's care
 With prodigal rewarding;
But Beauty is too used to run
To Mitford's bower—to want the sun
 To light her through the garden!

And here, all summers are comprised—
The nightly frosts shrink exorcised
 Before the priestly moonshine!
And every wind with stolid feet,
In wandering down the alleys sweet,
 Steps lightly on the sunshine;

And (having promised Harpocrate
Among the nodding roses, that
 No harm shall touch his daughters)
Gives quite away the noisy sound,
He dares not use upon such ground,
 To ever-trick ling waters.

Yet, sun and wind! what can ye do,
But make the leaves more brightly shew
 In posies newly gathered?—
I look away from all. your best;
To one poor flower unlike the rest,—
 A little flower half-withered.

I do not think it ever was
A pretty flower,—to make the grass
 Look greener where it reddened:
And now it seems ashamed to be
Alone, in all this company,
 Of aspect shrunk and saddened!

A chamber-window was the spot
It grew in, from a garden-pot,
 Among the city shadows:
If any, tending it, might seem
To smile, 'twas only in a dream
 Of nature in the meadows.

How coldly, on its head, did fall
The sunshine, from the city Avail,
 In pale refraction driven!
How sadly plashed upon its leaves
The raindrops, losing in the eaves
 The first sweet news of Heaven!

And those who planted, gathered it
In gamesome or in loving fit,
 And sent it as a token
Of what their city pleasures he,—
For one, in Devon by the sea
 And garden-blooms, to look on.

But she, for whom the jest was meant,
With a grave passion innocent
 Receiving what was given,—
Oh! if her face she turned then, . . .
Let none say 'twas to gaze again
 Upon the flowers of Devon!

Because, whatever virtue dwells
In genial skies—warm oracles
 For gardens brightly springing,—
The flower which grew beneath your eyes,
Ah, sweetest friends, to mine supplies
 A beauty worthier singing!