Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. 1922.

The Rose and the Wind

Philip Bourke Marston (1850–1887)

WHEN, think you, comes the Wind,

The Wind that kisses me and is so kind?

Lo, how the Lily sleeps! her sleep is light;

Would I were like the Lily, pale and white!

Will the Wind come?

Perchance for you too soon.

If not, how could I live until the noon?

What, think you, Beech-tree, makes the Wind delay?

Why comes he not at breaking of the day?

Hush, child, and, like the Lily, go to sleep.

You know I cannot.

Nay, then, do not weep.

Your lover comes: be happy now, O Rose!

He softly through my bending branches goes.

Soon he shall come, and you shall feel his kiss.

Already my flush’d heart grows faint with bliss;

Love, I have long’d for you through all the night.

And I to kiss your petals warm and bright.

Laugh round me, Love, and kiss me; it is well.

Nay, have no fear, the Lily will not tell.

’Twas dawn when first you came; and now the sun

Shines brightly and the dews of dawn are done.

’Tis well you take me so in your embrace;

But lay me back again into my place,

For I am worn, perhaps with bliss extreme.

Nay, you must wake, Love, from this childish dream.

’Tis you, Love, who seem changed; your laugh is loud,

And ’neath your stormy kiss my head is bow’d.

O Love, O Wind, a space will you not spare?

Not while your petals are so soft and fair.

My buds are blind with leaves, they cannot see,—

O Love, O Wind, will you not pity me?

O Wind, a word with you before you pass;

What did you to the Rose that on the grass

Broken she lies and pale, who loved you so?

Roses must live and love, and winds must blow.