Explore "The Reaper and the Flowers" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
There is a Reaper, whose name is Death, / And, with his sickle keen, / He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, / And the flowers that grow between.
"Shall I have naught that is fair? " saith he; / "Have naught but the bearded grain? / Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me, / I will give them all back again."
He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes, / He kissed their drooping leaves; / It was for the Lord of Paradise / He bound them in his sheaves.
"My Lord has need of these flowerets gay," / The Reaper said, and smiled; / "Dear tokens of the earth are they, / Where he was once a child.
"They shall all bloom in fields of light, / Transplanted by my care, / And saints, upon their garments white, / These sacred blossoms wear."
And the mother gave, in tears and pain, / The flowers she most did love; / She knew she should find them all again / In the fields of light above.
O, not in cruelty, not in wrath, / The Reaper came that day; / 'T was an angel visited the green earth, / And took the flowers away.