See daily showers rejoice the thirsty earth.
And bless the flowery buds succeeding birth. [ Prior ]

Gorgeous flowerets in the sunlight shining.
Blossoms flaunting in the eye of day,
Tremulous leaves, with soft and silver lining,
Buds that open only to decay. [ Longfellow ]

So work the honey-bees;
Creatures, that by a rule in nature teach
The art of order to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king and officers of sorts;
Where some, like magistrates, correct at home;
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad;
Others, like soldiers, armed in their stings,
Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds;
Which pillage they, with merry march, bring home.
To the tent royal of their emperor;
Who, busied in his majesty, surveys
The singing masons building roofs of gold;
The civil citizens kneading up the honey;
The poor mechanic porters crowding in
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate;
The sad-ey'd justice, with his surly hum.
Delivering over to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone. [ William Shakespeare ]

That same dew, which sometime on the buds was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls, stood now within the pretty flowerets' eyes, like tears that did their own disgrace bewail. [ William Shakespeare ]

In the hands of genius, the driest stick becomes an Aaron's rod, and buds and blossoms out in poetry. Is he a Burns? the sight of a mountain daisy unseals the fountains of his nature, and he embalms the bonny gem in the beauty of his spirit. Is he a Wordsworth? at his touch all nature is instinct with feeling; the spirit of beauty springs up in the footsteps of his going, and the darkest, nakedest grave becomes a sunlit bank empurpled with blossoms of life. [ H. N. Hudson ]