Cardamine pratensis

Cardamine pratensis, the cuckoo flower, lady's smock, mayflower, or milkmaids, is a flowering plant in the family Brassicaceae. It is a perennial herb native throughout most of Europe and western Asia. The specific name pratensis is Latin for "meadow".

The cuckoo flower (Cardamine pratensis)

Quotes

• When daisies pied and violets blue,
    And lady-smocks all silver-white,
  And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue
    Do paint the meadows with delight,
  The cuckoo then, on every tree,
  Mocks married men; for thus sings he,
    Cuckoo!
  Cuckoo, cuckoo!—O word of fear,
  Unpleasing to a married ear!
  • William Shakespeare, Loves Labours Lost (1598), V, ii