NAY, fling not down those faded flowers, Too late they're scatter'd round; And violet and rose-leaf lie Together on the ground. How carefully this very morn Those buds were cull'd and wreathed! And, mid the cloud of that dark air, How sweet a sigh they breathed! And many a gentle word was said Above their morning dye, -- How that the rose had touch'd thy cheek, The violet thine eye. Methinks, if but for memory, I should have kept these flowers; Ah! all too lightly does thy heart Dwell upon vanish'd hours. Already has thine eager hand Stripp'd yonder rose-hung bough; The wreath that bound thy raven curls, Thy feet are on it now. That glancing smile, it seems to say "Thou art too fanciful: What matters it what roses fade, While there are more to cull?" Ay, I was wrong to ask of thee Such gloomy thoughts as mine: Thou in thy Spring, how shouldst thou dream Of Autumn's pale decline? Young, lovely, loved, -- oh! far from thee Life's after-dearth and doom: Long ere thou learn how memory clings To even faded bloom! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A BOOK OF AIRS: SONG 4 by THOMAS CAMPION IN THE HOLY NATIVITY [OF OUR LORD GOD]; AS SUNG BY SHEPHERDS by RICHARD CRASHAW EVENING HYMN by REGINALD HEBER RAILROAD RHYME by JOHN GODFREY SAXE THE LAND OF NOD by ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON A DEDICATION by ALFRED TENNYSON FRAGMENTS INTENDED FOR DEATH'S JEST-BOOK: A LOFTY MIND by THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES |