Page:The works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld volume 1.djvu/378

 is my stem and dry, no root is found To draw nutritious juices from the ground; Yet of your ivory fingers' magic touch The quickening power and strange effect is such, My shrivelled trunk a sudden shade extends, And from rude storms your tender frame defends; A hundred times a day my head is seen Crowned with a floating canopy of green; A hundred times, as struck with sudden blight, The spreading verdure withers to the sight. Not Jonah's gourd by power unseen was made So soon to flourish, and so soon to fade.