The Flower of the Desert

Why art thou thus in thy beauty cast,

O lonely, loneliest flower;

Where the sound of song hath never pass'd

From human hearth or bower?

I pity thee, for thy heart of love,

For that glowing heart, that fain

Would breathe out joy with each wind to rove--

In vain, lost thing! in vain! 

I pity thee, for thy wasted bloom,

For thy glory's, fleeting hour,

For the desert place, thy living tomb--

O lonely, loneliest flower!

I said—but a low voice made reply,

"Lament not for the flower !

Though its blossoms all unmark'd must die,

They have had a glorious dower.

" Though it blooms afar from the minstrel's way,

And the paths where lovers tread;

Yet strength and hope, like an inborn day,

By its odours have been shed.

" Yes! dews more sweet than ever fell

O'er island of the blest,

Were shaken forth, from its purple bell,

On a suffering human breast.

" A wanderer came, as a stricken deer,

O'er the waste of burning sand,

He bore the wound of an Arab spear,

He fled from a ruthless band.

" And dreams of home in a troubled tide

Swept o'er his darkening eye,

And he lay down by the fountain side,

In his mute despair to die.

" But his glance was caught by the desert's flower,

The precious boon of Heaven;

And sudden hope, like a vernal shower,

To his fainting heart was given.

' For the bright flower spoke of one above;

Of the presence felt to brood

With a spirit of pervading love,

O'er the wildest solitude.

" Oh! the seed was thrown those wastes among

In a bless'd and gracious hour,

For the lorn one rose in heart made strong,

By the lonely, loneliest flower !"

                                              ​~Mrs. Hemans