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 No matter how obscure the lonely place

Where meadow flower lifts its tender face,

It sheds a perfume just as pure and sweet

As if it grew where gaudy footsteps pace.

Goldenrod

The Autumn sunbeams come in rifts of gold

Across the fields and by the lapping sea;

And as I pass, the tufted Goldenrod

Bows royally in silence unto me.

Though heralder of Winter's coming stay,

And soft reminder of the Summer dead,

No arrogance of manner marks thy day,

Oh, Goldenrod. And on thy crimson head

The crown of fulness, of completeness rests,

The sunshine of an hundred Summer days;

And garnered love that we have won and lost

Thy silence keeps. And all the burnished ways

Of woodland vale and sedgy-covered fields

Are gladdened by thy presence, for the sod

Sends up its dearest offering of the year

In thy rich colors, pensive Goldenrod.