---
title: 'Girardeau’s “Flower of Hope”'
type: post
author: 'R. Andrew Myers'
date: 2019-06-03
url: https://confessional.org/blog/2019-girardeaus-flower-of-hope
---

# Girardeau’s “Flower of Hope”

Chapter 11 in [George A. Blackburn’s](/authors/george-andrew-blackburn) *The Life Work of* [*John L. Girardeau*](/authors/john-lafayette-girardeau)*, D.D., LL.D.: Late Professor in the Theological Seminary, Columbia, S.C.* (1916) gives a guided tour of the poetry produced by the great Southern Presbyterian theologian. One representative poem given for purposes of devotional meditation today is his poem “The Flower of Hope.”

**The Flower of Hope**

> When Eve, our first mother, forlorn,
> Was banished the garden of God,
> She plucked at the root of a thorn
> A flower be-sprinkled with blood.
> 
> And we, the sad children of Eve,
> May find the same blood-tinctured rose;
> The emblem of Hope when we grieve,
> Midst thorny afflictions it blows.
> 
> It blooms in the chamber of woe,
> Where widows are drooping the head.
> And little ones timidly go
> A tip-toe to gaze on the dead.
> 
> It grows where the stormy winds rave
> In this valley of sin and of gloom;
> It springs from the mould of the grave,
> And twines rounds the gates of the tomb.
> 
> Dear Fanny, ‘tis faith in the Cross
> Which causes this flower divine
> To bloom in the sepulchre’s moss;
> Its promise of glory be thine!