Flower of the mountain! by the wanderer's hand
Robbed of thy beauty's short-lived sunny day;
Didst thou but blow to gem the stranger's way,
And bloom, to wither in the stranger's land?
Hueless and scentless as thou art,
How much that stirs the memory,
How much, much more, that thrills the heart,
Thou faded thing, yet lives in thee!
Where is thy beauty? in the grassy blade,
There lives more fragrance, and more freshness now;
Yet oh! not all the flowers that bloom and fade,
Are half so dear to memory's eye as thou.
The dew that on the mountain lies,
The breeze that o'er the mountain sighs,
Thy parent stem will nurse and nourish;
But thou—not e'en those sunny eyes
As bright, as blue, as thine own skies,
Thou faded thing! can make thee flourish.