A Victorian Flower Dictionary - Mandy Kirkby [27]
Flocks of the memories of the day draw near
The dovecote doors of sleep.
Oh, which are they that come through sweetest light
Of all these homing birds?
Which with the straightest and the swiftest flight?
Your words to me, your words!
ALICE MEYNELL
POPPY
Fantastic Extravagance
‘It is an intensely simple, intensely floral, flower. All silk and flame, a scarlet cup … like a burning coal fallen from Heaven’s altars.’
FROM PROSERPINA, JOHN RUSKIN
When in bud, the poppy holds on tightly to its emerging flower; until suddenly, almost in the blink of an eye, the two imprisoning sepals are shaken to the ground and its floral glory is revealed. In a ravishing spread of colours, from blood red to deep yellow, crushed-silk petals shimmering in the sun, the poppy provides a show of extraordinary lavishness. Yet its flowers remain open for just a few days and then all is finished. So much for just a moment of splendour, but what luxury and infinite pleasure on the way!
The poppy’s original home is the Mediterranean and the Middle East, but its cultivation in western and northern Europe is centuries old: the opium poppy was well known in the fifteenth century for its narcotic properties. Several varieties were grown in the Victorian garden, including strains of the wild field poppy and Iceland poppies from Siberia, but the extravagant and high-standing blooms of the opium and oriental varieties with their feathery and fringed petals were the most prized, especially because of their associations with the East, a land of colour, sensuality and visual spectacle.
This dream of the Orient was captured perfectly by John Frederick Lewis in his 1865 painting In the Bey’s Garden. A young woman from the harem is gathering flowers; tall, rich red poppies are prominent, bathed in a clear, sharp light. Like the poppies, the woman is an ornament, an object for display, and the harem itself an enchanted pleasure-ground, a world far removed from the strict moralistic society of the Victorians. Lewis spent ten years in Egypt, far longer than any other Orientalist painter, and his greatest pleasure was to spend long periods camped in the desert hinterland under the starlit Egyptian nights.
POPPIES
The poppies in the garden, they all wear frocks of silk,
Some are purple, some are pink, and others white as milk,
Light, light, for dancing in – for dancing when the breeze
Plays a little two-step for the blossoms and the bees:
Fine, fine for dancing – all frilly at the hem,
Oh! when I watch the poppies dance I long to dance like them.
The poppies in the garden have let their silk frocks fall
All about the border paths; but where are they at all?
Here a frill, there a flounce – a rag of silky red,
But not a poppy-girl is left; I think they’ve gone to bed;
Gone to bed and gone to sleep and weary they must be,
For each has left her box of dreams upon the stem for me.
FFRIDA WOLFE
ROSE
White – A Heart Unacquainted with Love
Pink – Grace Pale Peach – Modesty
Burgundy – Unconscious Beauty
Moss – Confession of Love Red – Love
Purple – Enchantment Orange – Fascination
Yellow – Infidelity
The rose is the fairest and sweetest of the flowers. Nature seems to have exhausted all her skill in the freshness, the fragrance, the delicate colour and the gracefulness that she has bestowed upon the rose. It embellishes the whole earth, is the interpreter of all our feelings and mingles with our joys and festivities. No wonder it is an emblem for love, the most important and universal of our passions.
For centuries, only a handful of varieties were cultivated – the gallica, the alba, the musk, damask and the moss or cabbage rose – in delicate pinks, whites and reds. But in the nineteenth century there was an explosion of newcomers, including yellow tea roses from China with their musky scent, and the prolific and highly fragrant Bourbon roses from France via Madagascar. As the century progressed, shades of orange, peach and scarlet were added to the spectrum.
The rose has been the emblem for love since