ROSA IGNOTA
Shall grow: he shall know no more
The wonder of spring:
He shall sing—
But a shadow shall lie before.
He shall find no thing
Whereby he may linger, and say,
Behold! I have found the day.
His day is over: utterly he shall die,
My Rose, under the sky.
He shall lie with the worm,
And so no more with thee ;
There shall be set this term
To his mortality.
Yet shall he worship thee
With his tears
For a few short years.
And then he shall be
Nothing at all to thee,
Who sang thee when no other man would sing thee,
Who brought unto thee all that he could bring thee.
Night, that art mother of our quietness,
Who bendest deep, dark eyes o’er our distress,
In thee shall sleep his ashes ; let him lie
Alone under the sky,
Nor wake again :
He hath paid for his life with his pain.
He oweth naught
Unto the universe,
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