ONLY a rose in a glass,
Set by a sick man’s bed;
The day was weary, the day was long,
But the rose it spoke with a voice like song,
And this is what it said:
“I know that the wind is keen,
And the drifted snows lie deep;
I know that the cruel ice lies spread
O’er the laughing brook and the lake’s blue bed,
And the fountain’s rush and leap.
“I know, I know all this;
Yet here I sit—a rose!
Smiling I sit, and I feel no fear,
For God is good and the Spring is near,
Couched in the shrouding snows.
“Canst thou not smile with me?
Art thou less strong than I?
Less strong at heart than a feeble flower
Which lives and blossoms but one brief hour,
And then must droop and die?
“Surely, thou canst endure
Thy little pains and fears,
Before whose eyes, all fair and bright,
In endless vistas of delight
Stretch the Eternal Years!”
Then over the sick man’s heart
Fell a deep and hushed repose.
He turned on his pillow and whispered low,
That only the listening flower might know:
“I thank thee, Rose, dear Rose.”