The Poppies Look Lovely in the Morning

A common poppy field near Soshartyan, Hungary.

Photograph: Peter Komka/EPA


These poppies do sometimes represent death but not from opium since Papaver somniferum is the Opium Poppy but this one is the Common Poppy, sometimes known as the Flanders Poppy.  (WIKI:  Papaver rhoeas, Papaver somniferum)

While the Opium Poppy can bring death with opium and its products, the Flanders Poppy remembers those who have died in battle.


"In Flanders Fields"

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

- John McCrae (The Great War 1914-1918)