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1
O FLOWER of passion, rocked by balmy gales, | |
| Flushed with life’s ecstasy, | |
| Before whose golden glow the poppy pales | |
| And yields her sovereignty! | |
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| Child of the ardent south, thy burning heart | 5 |
| Has felt the sun’s hot kiss. | |
| Thy creamy petals falling half apart | |
| Quiver with recent bliss. | |
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| For joy at thy unequalled loveliness, | |
| He woos with fierce delight; | 10 |
| And thy glad soul, half faint with his caress, | |
| Yet glories in his might. | |
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| Thy sighs go out in perfume on the air, | |
| Rich incense of thy love, | |
| And mystic lights, an opalescence rare, | 15 |
| Play round thee from above | |
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2
SO thou dost riot through the glad spring days, | |
| Sun-wooed and revelling in eager life, | |
| Till all the shadowed fragrance of the ways | |
| With thy rich bloom and glowing tints is rife. | 20 |
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| A joyous smile that hides a secret tear, | |
| A note of music with a minor strain, | |
| A heart of gold where crimson wounds appear, | |
| Thou breathest all love’s sweetness and its pain. | |
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| Yet suddenly, even at thy loveliest, | 25 |
| Thou palest with thine own intensity. | |
| Ah, Passion’s child, thou art most truly blest, | |
| To bloom one perfect day, and then to die. | |
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