The Rhodora

In the late spring
With the veils of the pastel world
Woven into your softness;
You present as mere nosegays
To the too proud and perfumed dahlia.
In dusk I hear the breathless silence.

But how arresting your petals—
A thousand crimson arms of beauty
Hold aloft the echoes of joy, While the wind curbs its madness
Simply to pause before you.
Dare we speak of the hues themselves And the lessons that lay like petals?
What could be more enchanting,
They are lost in the grave stillness
Of various beings remembered in you.

• Ralph Waldo Emerson