The Poppy

The Poppy written by William Henry Davies

From "Farewell to Poesy", 1910

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Sweet Poppy, when thy beauty’s gone,
Thy leaves will fall, thy life be done.

No sooner do thy leaves decay,
Than thou dost throw thy life away.

Thou dost not keep them like the Rose,
When she her crimson charms doth lose.

Whose smudged face for days is seen,
Which neither dew nor rain can clean.

Thou dost not shrink and dry at last,
To mock that beauty of thy past.

The first soft breeze that comes along
Shall strip thee - when thy leaves go wrong.

And when to-morrow we look there,
The place is clean where thy leaves were.

Thou dost not linger on, like man,
Till thou art bent, and dry, and wan.

“So let me die when my charms fade,
Like that sweet flower” - said Beauty’s maid.

“So, like that Poppy, let me die,”
Said Genius - “when my springs go dry.”

This work is in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or less.