Love and Friendship (Brontë)

Love and Friendship (Brontë) by Emily Brontë

From Selections from the literary remains of Emily and Anne Brontë (1850) and reprinted in The Complete Poems of Emily Brontë (1908).

Love is like the wild rose-briar;   Friendship like the holly-tree. The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms,   But which will bloom most constantly? The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring,   Its summer blossoms scent the air; Yet wait till winter comes again,   And who will call the wild-briar fair? Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now,   And deck thee with the holly's sheen, That, when December blights thy brow,   He still may leave thy garland green.