Roses I saw, and poppies all alight
With colours of the dawn, and rainbow hues
Drawn from the sun and all the secret dews
Distilled upon them from the brooding night,
And delicate sweet-peas so purely dight
They must have grown where icy winds refuse
To blow, or haply where nuns dream and muse
In holy meditation, out of sight
Of the rough world;--flowers of moonlight sheen
And golden hearts, and velvet pansies turned
The room they stood in to a garden scene
Of loveliness so exquisite, I yearned
Through all my soul to be as chastely clean
As these, and more my raptured eye discerned.