C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

Oscar Wilde

And all the woods are alive with the murmur and sound of spring,

And the rosebud breaks into pink on the climbing briar,

And the crocus bed is a quivering moon of fire

Girdled round with the belt of an amethyst ring.

Chrysanthemums from gilded argosy

Unload their gaudy scentless merchandise.

Her hair is bound with myrtle leaves,

(Green leaves upon her golden hair!)

Green grasses through the yellow sheaves

Of autumn corn are not more fair.

I have my beauty,—you your art—

Nay, do not start:

One world was not enough for two

Like me and you.

Set in this stormy Northern sea,

Queen of these restless fields of tide,

England! what shall men say of thee,

Before whose feet the worlds divide?

The wild bee reels from bough to bough

With his furry coat and his gauzy wing,

Now in a lily cup, and now

Setting a jacinth bell a-swing,

In his wandering.

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