If Flowers Had Ghosts

If flowers had ghosts, that thin perfume 
Of buds long picked should haunt your room — 
Your room that dreams in ancient way, 
Where beaux have knelt with Spring's bouquet 
For belles in silk of Jacquard's loom: 

When wintry fields are bare of bloom 
They'd come a-tremble from the tomb; 
You'd love them when the skies were grey, 
If flowers had ghosts! 

So now, when April fires the broom 
And cowslips clamber up the coomb, 
You would not — this I greatly pray — 
Forget the friends of yesterday, 
Who spoke of her in days of gloom, 
If flowers had ghosts?