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Henry Vaughan
Peace
My soul, there is a country
Far beyond the stars,
Where stands a winged sentry
All skilful in the wars:
There, above noise and danger,
Sweet Peace sits crown'd with smiles,
And One born in a manger
Commands the beauteous files.
He is thy gracious Friend,
And - O my soul, awake! -
Did in pure love descend
To die here for thy sake.
If thou canst get but thither,
There grows the flower of Peace,
The Rose that cannot wither,
Thy fortress, and thy ease.
Leave then thy foolish ranges;
For none can thee secure
But One who never changes -
Thy God, thy life, thy cure.
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Christina Georgina Rossetti
The October Garden
In my Autumn garden I was fain
To weep between these scattered roses;
I stared at one last rosebud which uncloses
To Autumn days of sun and rain
When everyone's hard on the wane
And can't yet heed the summer's heavy veil,
Nor even hear the nightingale.
Fancy daisies by the garden walk;
Why, you're inferior to roses:
More shy yet free the rosebud which uncloses
Fine-scented, young, perched on the stalk,
The one which frosty, deft winds balk;
Ah, perfect rose though very last of all,
Ah, perfect rose though at the fall.
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Robert Herrick
The Teary Funeral Ritual of the Rose
The Rose was sick and smiling died;
So, being to be sanctified,
Near by the cot, each sighing, stood
The young and woeful sisterhood:
Some shut the eyes, as some did bring,
To wash her, water of a spring;
Few set her out when others wept,
Yet all an even fast they kept:
Unsure, the ecclesiastic nuns
The holy hymn and trental sung.
Ah yuh! what fine scent everywhere,
As any fragrance of Heaven there.
At last, when crying for the dead
And funeral rite succeeded,
They, sorry, hove one woven loom,
And closed her up as in a tomb.
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William Browne
The Rose
Oh rose, as fair as ever saw the North,
Grew in a cosy garden all alone;
Such fancy flower He has not set forth,
Nor nicer garden yet was never known:
Oh, ladies sang about it morn and noon;
A canny bard of its hue ditties made;
The funny fairies by the foggy moon -
They fed the rose then kiss'd the gentle shade.
Yet - Uh! - the gardener, he much careless grew;
The wives and fairies, they weren't to stay;
Under the sun, each caterpillar chew'd
The tiny bud, then cut out every spray.
O, save the stock! If He cues no supplies,
The cutest bloomer of the garden dies.
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