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[[open book, 2 pages]]
[[page 1]]
Six little packets of Burpee's seeds,
Absurdly tiny and hard they seemed,
But I laid them asleep in the garden beds
And covered and wished them pleasant dreams.

Before they came my garden lay
All bare of cheer, a deserted inn,
But now behold what holiday crowd
Is gathered, flaunting gay within--

Such dowdy little petunia bodies,
Carelessly wearing their starchless frills;
And stiff and stocky touch-me-nots
Standing straight like soldiers' drill;

And poppies that scramble to greet the bees,
Green little night caps flung to the ground,
While a-stare they stand at early morn
In hastily donned and wrinkled gowns;
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[[page 2]]
And morning glories a-tremble hang,
With innocent eyes to stare at me,
Though plain I see on each of them
Gold-dusty tracks of a rifling bee;

Hollyhock ladies, stately, quaint,
Forever go climbing spiral stairs;
And sleeping four-o'-clocks all day
Nod and dream in perfumed air,

But through the night they stand awake,
Watchful, quiet, absorbed they are,
With hundreds of little telescopes
Upward trained upon the stars.

No more my garden's desolate inn,
But night and day a crowded bower--
So good each day, since they are come--
I follow the bees from flower to flower.

Ollie Depew
424 Linden Walk
Lexington, Ky.