Rose

“ Is it any marvel now that round the visible object should associate tributary feelings of pleasure? How many pleasing and tender sentiments gather round the rose! Yet the rose is beautiful in itself. It was beautiful to the child by its colour, its texture, its softly-shaded leaf, and the contrast between the flower and the foliage. Love, and poetry, and the tender regrets of advanced life, have contributed a second dower of beauty. The rose is more to the youth and to the old man than it was to the child; but still to the last they both feel the pleasure of the child. ”

“ Pick up yon rose—the one bud that has strayed—
Cast down the lid. Our last tribute is paid
To the infant, the child, the girl, and the maid,
Wife and mother.
Let her sleep in the bloom
Of the roses' perfume,
One flower with another.
All white, white, white,
Let them sleep through the night,
To the light.
From the earth was their birth;
On the earth grew they in beauty, burning
With whitest, purest flames,
To earth returning. ”

“ To thee the roses belong, thy voice is the nightingale's song:
Give thou the rose a kiss, it blushes like thy mouth's bliss:
Flowers in a picture seem not flowers, but flowers in a dream:
Who paints the rose's bloom, paints not the rose's perfume.
In complete contrast to this conceited and euphuistic style of composition stands a slight snatch of rustic melody, consisting of little but reiteration and refrain. ”

“ For the rose, ho, the rose! is the eye of the flowers,
⁠Is the blush of the meadows that feel themselves fair,—
Is the lightning of beauty, that strikes through the bowers
⁠On pale lovers that sit in the glow unaware. ”

“ Or when it bends beneath the up-springing lark,
Or mountain-finch alighting. And the rose
(In vain the darling of successful love)
Stands, like some boasted beauty of past years,
The thorns remaining, and the flowers all gone. ”

“ A rose that had dropped from its stem and which he once in the darkest night picked up under her window, was to him the rose of an order; its withered honey-cup was the potpourri of his sweetest dreams and his flora of pleasure:--thus dost thou, lofty Destiny, oftentimes place immortal man's heaven under a faded rose-leaf, often on the blossom-cup of a forget-me-not, often in a piece of land 305,000 miles square. ”

“ And what a victory this is, to be ranked next the rose even by one person who loves her garden. Think of the wonderful beauty triumphed over—the lilies, the irises, the carnations, the violets, the frail and delicate poppies, the magnificent larkspurs, the burning nasturtiums, the fierce marigolds, the smooth, cool pansies. ”

“ The Rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem
For that sweet odour which doth in it live.
The Canker-blooms have full as deep a dye
As the perfumèd tincture of the Roses,
Hang on such thorns, and play as wantonly
When summer’s breath their maskèd buds discloses:
But—for their virtue only is their show—
They live unwoo’d and unrespected fade,
Die to themselves. Sweet Roses do not so;
Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made.
And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth,
When that shall vade, my verse distils your truth. ”

“ To-day I have put by the prodigious achievements of human art, and am living in the supreme hour of the rose. The town is ablaze with roses; the very streets and houses breathe them to my nostrils. For I have risen with the whimsey in my head, and all Nature is one blushing rose. The air is scented with the summer rain; the squares are joyous. There comes my mistress with a red rose at her bosom this merry morning. Drops sparkle between the petals; she wears the first white garment of the year; everywhere is a rose—a rose. ”

“ Not so the poet's favourite Rose,
She blooms beyond a second day,
And even some later beauty shews—
Some charm still lingering in decay.
Thus those, who thro' life's path have pass'd,
A path how seldom strewn with flowers! ”

“ Come thou with me to Love's enchanted bower
High overhead the trellised roses burn;
Beneath thy feet behold the feathery fern,—
A leaf without a flower.
What though the rose leaves fall? They still are sweet,
And have been lovely in their beauteous prime,
While the bare frond seems ever to repeat,
"For us no bud, no blossom, wakes to greet
The joyous flowering time!"
Heed thou the lesson. Life has leaves to tread
And flowers to cherish; summer round thee glows;
Wait not till autumn's fading robes are shed,
But while its petals still are burning red
Gather life's full-blown rose! ”

“ Art thou heir to roses dead— Roses that their petals shed In the winds of long ago? Who bequeathed to thee the glow Of thy perfect, radiant heart? What proud queen of fire and snow Lived to make thee what thou art?
Who gave thee thy nameless grace And the beauty of thy face, Touched thy lips with fragrant wine, Pledging thee in cups divine? On some long-forgotten day, When earth kept glad holiday, One bright rose was born, I think, Dewy, sweet, and soft and pink— Born, more blest than others are, To be thy progenitor! ”

“ Roses embowering with nought they embower!
Come then, complete incompletion, O comer,
Pant through the blueness, perfect the summer!
Breathe but one breath
Rose-beauty above,
And all that was death
Grows life, grows love,
Grows love! ”

“ A SONG OF ROSES 'Tis time to sing of roses: of roses all ablow,
To every vagrant passing breeze they dip a courtesy low,
'Tis time to sing of roses! for June is here, you know.
One song for true love's roses of sweetest deepest red,
Some heart will wear you faithfully when life itself hath fled,
And for the white rose sing a song—the white rose for the dead. ”

“ Where there are thorns are roses, and I saw a line of red,
A little wreath of roses around His radiant head.
A red rose is His Sacred Heart, a white rose is His face,
And His breath has turned the barren world to a rich and flowery place. ”

“ Later in the season, we become critical—we reject the full-blown flower for the half-open bud, but just now we are eager to feast our eyes upon a rose—a true, perfect rose—with all her beauties opening to the light, all her silken petals unfolding in rich profusion about her fragrant heart. ”

“ The cream-white flowers grew in clusters, and the buds were really beautiful, but color and form are only the body of the rose; the soul, the real self, is the rose odor, and no rose-soul was incarnated in its petals. ”

“ What blossoms could bloom on the breast of the youthful beauty so typical of the infinity of hope, and sweet thoughts that lie folded up in her own heart, as fair young rose buds? What wreath could so lovingly encircle the head of the bride, as that of white roses, full of purity and grace? And, last of all, what blossoms, so expressive of human affections, could we find at the bier, to take the place of the rose? ”

“ Long she lay watching the bright shadows, and listening to the song of the rose, while through the long night dreams of lovely things floated like bright clouds through her mind; while the rose bent lovingly above her, and sang in the clear moonlight. ”

“ Rose, like a mountain drifted, high in air.
It rose! It rose! It covered all the coast;
Under its wrinkled belly rang the shells;
Its monstrous feet, its big toes hard and scaled,
Were spread out heavy on the shingles wet. ”

“ Would she come forth to greet the aeonian summer?
Glistening with feathery dust of silver? or
Dull red, and seared with spots of black ingrained?
"I know," he said, "some women fail of life!
The rose hath shed her leaves: is she a rose?" ”

“ To most men a rose is only a flower, but to the exceptional man it is a miracle, for as he gazes at the glorious bloom with its many-tinted petals he visualizes the tiny single rose—the common dog-rose—from which all roses in their wondrous diversity of colour and shape and size and perfume have sprung. ”

“ That bathes and grips the mighty worlds around!
O festal mornings, calm in loveliness,
Rose whose pure face the dewdrops all caress,
Birds flying toward us, like some presage white,
Gardens of sombre shade or frailest light! ”

“ The blushing tints in the soft bloom on the fruit, or the delicate painting on the flower, are not more exquisite than was the blending of the rose and lily in her gentle face, or the deep blue of her eye. ”

“ "Why, what a wonderful piece of luck!" he cried; "here is a red rose! I have never seen any rose like it in all my life. It is so beautiful that I am sure it has a long Latin name;" ”

“ The rose buds, and the rose blooms and the rose
Bows in the dews, and in its fulness, lo,
Is in the lover's hand,—then on the breast
Of her he loves,—and there dies.—And who knows
Which fate of all a rose may undergo
Is fairest, dearest, sweetest, loveliest?
Nay, we are children: we will not mature. ”

“ Just watch on some summer morning how the early rays of the sun arouse the slumbering rose from its blissful dreams, and remember that the rose responds because its body and soul are tuned to the melodies which the glorious sunlight is pouring into its enchanted ear. Remember also that what I have just described is not merely a flowery figure of speech, but that it is a concise description of a beautiful physical relationship, which science has discovered in the life of the rose. ”

“ GARLANDS OF ROSES ‘Let us crown ourselves with rose-buds,’80 cried the revellers in the Book of Wisdom, and at Roman feasts host and guests alike wore roses on their hair or in garlands round their necks.
So in the heavenly mansions, where life is a perpetual feast, unfading roses crown the elect. Wreaths of roses are the symbol of heavenly joy and are worn alike by angels and by the human souls who have entered bliss. ”

“ A ROSE WILL FADE
You were always a dreamer. Rose, red Rose,
⁠As you swung on your perfumed spray,
Swinging, and all the world was true,
Swaying, what did it trouble you?
⁠A rose will fade in a day. ”

“ A rose made him think of quaint gardens and gracious ladies and Edmund Waller and sundials, and a thousand pleasant things that, at one time or another, had befallen him or some one else. A rose touched life at a hundred pretty points. ”

“ While Smiles and Songs, with Wine incite,
To wing our moments with Delight.
Rose by far the fairest birth,
Which Spring and Nature cull from Earth—
Rose whose sweetest perfume given,
Breathes our thoughts from Earth to Heaven. ”

“ A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers' foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight. ”

“ To give me a half-blown rose, a fire-white rose,
Its stem all warm yet from the tight-shut hand.
The little gift seemed somehow more to me
Than all men strive for in the turbid towns,
Than all they hoard up through a long wild life. ”

“ The rose is as a dart.
The lotos is Nirvana:
The rose is Mary's heart.
The rose is deathless, restless,
The splendor of our pain:
The flush and fire of labor
That builds, not all in vain. . . . ”

“ The rose is such a lady—
So stately, fresh, and sweet;
It joys to hold her image—
The rain pool at her feet.
They look such common lasses,
Those red pinks in a line;
The rose is such a lady—
So dignified and fine. ”

“ Being dedicated to the goddess of beauty and god of love, the Rose often plays her part in the tender and sentimental scenes so especially patronized by those tutelar divinities, and many an oft-used but still current simile is drawn from the blushing hue, the surpassing loveliness, and the cruel thorns of the fair emblem-flower. ”

“ The rose that is the expression of the highest and purest love springs from the blooming cheeks of my sweet child when, strengthened by sleep, it opens its eyes and smiles at me with all its affection! ”

“ Roses, roses! An interminable chain of these royal blossoms, red and white, wreathed by the radiant fingers of small rainbow-winged creatures as airy as moonlight mist, as delicate as thistledown! They cluster round me with smiling faces and eager eyes; they place the end of their rose-garland in my hand, and whisper, "FOLLOW!" ”

“ I have but to think of a rose and it is here. They have a spirit—oh, undoubtedly. 'You are a rose yourself,' they say. They tell me to look at the sunrise when I go to the silk-mill, at the sunset on the river—all the world a rose. The floor of heaven is paved with roses. ”

“ All the world it knelt to woo.
⁠A rose will bloom in a day.
I gather your petals, Rose, red Rose,
⁠The petals he threw away.
And all the world derided you;
Ah ! the world, how well it knew
⁠A rose will fade in a day. ”

“ Rose—the living rose—blushed upon us, and faltered under—over—yonder, till we were shut into a world of it, palpitating. It was as if we had gone{164} behind the soul of a woman’s blush, or the meaning of a sunrise. Whoever has known the passion for that color will understand why some of the spectators were with difficulty restrained from flinging themselves down into it, as into a sea of rapture. ”

“ Mischievous rose from the rose-tree swaying,
⁠Can I not bind thee nor hold thee?
⁠Can I not weave thee nor fold thee
In with thy sisters to staying?
Vain is my passion or praying,
Rose from the rose-tree swaying. ”

“ Who, in cultivating roses, has not spiritually felt the better for it? The subtlety of its fragrance, the grace of its form, the perfect harmony of its tones appeal to the imagination like music to the soul. In the whole range of nature's variety and completeness nothing so satisfies the idea of perfection as the rose. ”

“ May lean upon the rose's breast.
⁠But love delights, &c.
What though the rose's blushes fade,
And lilies droop beneath the shade,
In dormant life they still remain,
To grow, to bud, to bloom again. ”