dots-menu
×

Home  »  The Poetical Works In Four Volumes  »  Winter Roses

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.

Occasional Poems

Winter Roses

  • In reply to a flower gift from Mrs. Putnam’s school at Jamaica Plain.


  • MY garden roses long ago

    Have perished from the leaf-strewn walks;

    Their pale, fair sisters smile no more

    Upon the sweet-brier stalks.

    Gone with the flower-time of my life,

    Spring’s violets, summer’s blooming pride,

    And Nature’s winter and my own

    Stand, flowerless, side by side.

    So might I yesterday have sung;

    To-day, in bleak December’s noon,

    Come sweetest fragrance, shapes, and hues,

    The rosy wealth of June!

    Bless the young hands that culled the gift,

    And bless the hearts that prompted it;

    If undeserved it comes, at least

    It seems not all unfit.

    Of old my Quaker ancestors

    Had gifts of forty stripes save one;

    To-day as many roses crown

    The gray head of their son.

    And with them, to my fancy’s eye,

    The fresh-faced givers smiling come,

    And nine and thirty happy girls

    Make glad a lonely room.

    They bring the atmosphere of youth;

    The light and warmth of long ago

    Are in my heart, and on my cheek

    The airs of morning blow.

    O buds of girlhood, yet unblown,

    And fairer than the gift ye chose,

    For you may years like leaves unfold

    The heart of Sharon’s rose!

    1883.