So now you’ve got an idy why a man o’ fifty-four,
Who’s lived a cross old bachelor fer thirty year’ and more,
Is a-lookin’ glad and smilin’!—­And I’ve jest come into town
To git a pair o’ license fer to marry Mary Brown.

[Illustration:  (FARMER WHIPPLE—­BACHELOR—­TAILPIECE)]

[Illustration:  (THE ROSE—­TITLE)]

THE ROSE

It tossed its head at the wooing breeze;
  And the sun, like a bashful swain,
Beamed on it through the waving trees
  With a passion all in vain,—­
For my rose laughed in a crimson glee,
And hid in the leaves in wait for me.

The honey-bee came there to sing
  His love through the languid hours,
And vaunt of his hives, as a proud old king
  Might boast of his palace-towers: 
But my rose bowed in a mockery,
And hid in the leaves in wait for me.

The humming-bird, like a courtier gay,
  Dipped down with a dalliant song,
And twanged his wings through the roundelay
  Of love the whole day long: 
Yet my rose turned from his minstrelsy
And hid in the leaves in wait for me.

The firefly came in the twilight dim
  My red, red rose to woo—­
Till quenched was the flame of love in him
  And the light of his lantern too,
As my rose wept with dewdrops three
And hid in the leaves in wait for me.

And I said:  I will cull my own sweet rose—­
  Some day I will claim as mine
The priceless worth of the flower that knows
  No change, but a bloom divine—­
The bloom of a fadeless constancy
That hides in the leaves in wait for me!

But time passed by in a strange disguise,
  And I marked it not, but lay
In a lazy dream, with drowsy eyes,
  Till the summer slipped away,
And a chill wind sang in a minor key: 
“Where is the rose that waits for thee?”

* * * * *

I dream to-day, o’er a purple stain
  Of bloom on a withered stalk,
Pelted down by the autumn rain
  In the dust of the garden-walk,
That an Angel-rose in the world to be
Will hide in the leaves in wait for me.

HAS SHE FORGOTTEN?

I

Has she forgotten?  On this very May
We were to meet here, with the birds and bees,
As on that Sabbath, underneath the trees
We strayed among the tombs, and stripped away
The vines from these old granites, cold and gray—­
And yet indeed not grim enough were they
To stay our kisses, smiles and ecstasies,
Or closer voice-lost vows and rhapsodies. 
Has she forgotten—­that the May has won
Its promise?—­that the bird-songs from the tree
Are sprayed above the grasses as the sun
Might jar the dazzling dew down showeringly? 
Has she forgotten life—­love—­everyone—­
Has she forgotten me—­forgotten me?