Thomas Hood

To ---

Welcome, dear Heart, and a most kind good-morrow;
The day is gloomy, but our looks shall shine:--
Flowers I have none to give thee, but I borrow
Their sweetness in a verse to speak for thine.

Here are red roses, gather'd at thy cheeks,--
The white were all too happy to look white:
For love the rose, for faith the lily speaks;
It withers in false hands, but here 'tis bright!

Dost love sweet Hyacinth? Its scented leaf
Curls manifold,--all love's delights blow double:
'Tis said this flow'ret is inscribed with grief,--
But let that hint of a forgotten trouble.

I pluck'd the Primrose at night's dewy noon;
Like Hope, it show'd its blossoms in the night;--
'Twas, like Endymion, watching for the Moon!
And here are Sun-flowers, amorous of light!

These golden Buttercups are April's seal,--
The Daisy-stars her constellations be:
These grew so lowly, I was forced to kneel,
Therefore I pluck no Daisies but for thee!

Here's Daisies for the morn, Primrose for gloom
Pansies and Roses for the noontide hours:--
A wight once made a dial of their bloom,--
So may thy life be measured out by flowers!