The Lesser Celandine, or Pilewort.

The Lesser Celandine, or Pilewort.

Nature’s true poet, Wordsworth, dearly loved
The Lesser Celandine, and much its flowers
Delighted him, in lanes and woods, on moors,
Or near poor cottage doors, where’er he roved:
And he so hymn’d its praise, that I despair 5
Of telling, how, from childhood, it to me
Has been a thing of magic potency
To cheer my spirits, when the chilling air
Of Winter is departing, and bright Spring
Is calling out her flowers. Our fathers named 10
It Pilewort, for long with them was famed
Among their herbal healers. It doth bring
Joy, ere the Cuckoo’s note is heard, for we
Feel Spring has come, with flowers and minstrelsy.

George Markham Tweddell
[Sonnets on Trees and Flowers, p. 26]