Letter 8008: O queen with power, to whom gold and purple are worthless,

To Radegund — For Flowers Sent O powerful queen, to whom gold and purple are worthless — one who loves you honors you with small flowers. And if the thing itself is nothing, the color at least is there in the herbs: purple through the violets, a golden form through the crocus. Rich in the love of God, you have shunned the prizes of the world: despising those, you will keep these riches instead. Accept the gifts of varied flowers sent to you — the flowers to which the blessed life calls you all the more. You who now torture yourself, to be refreshed in the light to come — look from here at what kind of field will keep you. Through the fragile, fragrant branches we now offer, weigh from here how great a fragrance will revive you there. To her for whom these things are owed, I pray that when you come to that place, your gentle right hand may draw me too by your merits. Though the grace of paradise's flowers awaits you, these flowers here already long to see you again. And though they seem to please with their excellent fragrance, they adorn their own petals more when you return.

VIII Item ad eandem pro floribus transmissis O regina potens, aurum cui et purpura vile est, floribus ex parvis te veneratur amans. et si non res est, color est tamen ipsa per herbas: purpura per violas, aurea forma crocus. dives amore dei vitasti praemia mundi: illas contemnens has retinebis opes. suscipe missa tibi variorum munera florum, ad quos te potius vita beata vocat. quae modo te crucias, recreanda in luce futura, aspicis hinc qualis te retinebit ager. per ramos fragiles quos nunc praebemus olentes perpende hinc quantus te refovebit odor. haec cui debentur precor ut, cum veneris illuc, meque tuis meritis dextera blanda trahat. quamvis te expectet paradisi gratia florum, isti vos cupiunt iam revidere foris. et licet egregio videantur odore placere, plus ornant proprias te redeunte comas.