Reflections
Thoughts · Daily PostCandlemass Bells
CELEBRATING SNOWDROPS
Into the dark world a snowdrop comes: nature's white candles of hope and peace carrying within them a green heart, a symbol of God's renewing love. Pushing their way through often frozen soil, withstanding the cold winter, snowdrops are often perceived to be little white symbolic beacons of hope, harbingers of spring, transforming a dark world into one of light.
They appear fragile and vulnerable but also brave, bright and pure, a symbol of nature's resilience. You might not know that their bulbs are poisonous if eaten, but a compound extracted from them is used in the management of Alzheimer's.
TO A SNOWDROP
'Lone Flower, hemmed in with snows and white as they
But hardier far, once more I see thee bend
Thy forehead, as if fearful to offend,
Like an unbidden guest. Though day by day,
Storms, sallying from the mountain-tops, waylay
The rising sun, and on the plains descend;
Yet art thou welcome, welcome as a friend
Whose zeal outruns his promise! Blue-eyed May
Shall soon behold this border thickly set
With bright jonquils, their odours lavishing
On the soft west-wind and his frolic peers;
Nor will I then thy modest grace forget,
Chaste Snowdrop, venturous harbinger of Spring,
And pensive monitor of fleeting years!'
William Wordsworth (1819)
