Poems (Trask)/A Dead Rose

by Clara Augusta Jones Trask

A DEAD ROSE.

Three years ago to-night,—a summer night,
 With lines of purple in the western sky,
The sea-waves rolling up the beach foam white,
 And in the distance a ship sailing by,
A crescent moon pallid behind gray clouds,—
 Oh, why do young moons pale and sunsets die?—

We drifted on beyond the rocky isles
 That guard the broadening outlet of the bay,
And watched the billows, mighty piles on piles,
 As, bounding in, they drenched us with their spray;
And all the land, and all the starry sky,
 In perfect peace and silence tranced lay.

We anchored just below the reach of sand
 That glittered golden in the misty light;
And up the rocks we clambered hand in hand,
 Forgetting that around us crept the night;
There is no night for those who live and love:
 All time is merged in one intense delight.

How near it seems to me!—that dreamy hush
 Of silent sky, and subtle, sensuous air;
How 'neath his eyes my face burned with a flush
 No other glance can ever summon there!
His head bent down; I felt his gentle hand
 Cover my fingers, and his breath my hair.

He gathered from a bush, heavy with dew,
 A single rose, and touched it with his lips;
And henceforth roses, to my fancy, grew
 Sweet as the nectar that the brown bee sips.
He laid it on my cheek and, smiling, said,
 The roses there put his rose in eclipse.

Ah, well! 'tis over. Two long years ago
 I hid this rose with my most sacred things;
Its grace and glory gone, its light and glow,
 All—save the perfume that around it clings.
I lay it by,—the faint, sweet summer smell
 A sense of loss forever to me brings.