Known by several forenames including Common, Field, Corn and Flanders - every November they are worn in Commonwealth countries in memory of those who fell during the Great War - the particular colour of this poppy is only rivaled, but not matched, by one other British flower... the Scarlet Pimpernel. My ”Familiar Wild Flowers” (F. Edward Hulme - Cassel & Co. 1906) relates the impact of its colouring by saying... ”Though the Marsh Marigold flower is a perfectly pure and brilliant yellow; the White Campion, a white of spotless purity; the Borage as deep and unsullied a blue as could possibly be met with or imagined - these colours, beautiful as they are, must yield in brilliant strength and intensity to the scarlet of the Poppy.”
I love them as they appear in early morning light, back-lit by the rising sun, damp with dew, fragile petals from the newly emerged flowers rising above the nodding heads of those about to cast off their protective sepals.
