| Samuel Kettell, ed. Specimens of American Poetry. 1829. | | | | The Wild Honeysuckle | | By Philip Freneau (1752–1832) |
| | | FAIR flower, that dost so comely grow, | |
| Hid in this silent, dull retreat, | |
| Untouch’d thy honey’d blossoms blow, | |
| Unseen thy little branches greet: | |
| No roving foot shall find thee here, | 5 |
| No busy hand provoke a tear. | |
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| By Nature’s self in white array’d, | |
| She bade thee shun the vulgar eye, | |
| And planted here the guardian shade, | |
| And sent soft waters murmuring by; | 10 |
| Thus quietly thy summer goes, | |
| Thy days declining to repose. | |
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| Smit with those charms, that must decay, | |
| I grieve to see your future doom; | |
| They died—nor were those flowers less gay, | 15 |
| The flowers that did in Eden bloom; | |
| Unpitying frosts, and autumn’s power | |
| Shall leave no vestige of this flower. | |
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| From morning suns and evening dews | |
| At first thy little being came: | 20 |
| If nothing once, you nothing lose, | |
| For when you die you are the same; | |
| The space between is but an hour, | |
| The frail duration of a flower. | | | | |
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