Explore "Red Carnations" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
One time in Arcadie's fair bowers / There met a bright immortal band, / To choose their emblems from the flowers / That made an Eden of that land.
Sweet Constancy, with eyes of hope, / Strayed down the garden path alone / And gathered sprays of heliotrope, / To place in clusters at her zone.
True Friendship plucked the ivy green, / Forever fresh, forever fair. / Inconstancy with flippant mien / The fading primrose chose to wear.
One moment Love the rose paused by; / But Beauty picked it for her hair. / Love paced the garden with a sigh / He found no fitting emblem there.
Then suddenly he saw a flame, / A conflagration turned to bloom; / It even put the rose to shame, / Both in its beauty and perfume.
He watched it, and it did not fade; / He plucked it, and it brighter grew. / In cold or heat, all undismayed, / It kept its fragrance and its hue.
"Here deathless love and passion sleep," / He cried, "embodied in this flower. / This is the emblem I will keep. " / Love wore carnations from that hour.