Poem by Philip Bourke Marston

Roses and the Nightingale

In my garden it is night-time,
But a still time and a bright time,
For the moon rains down her splendor,
And my garden feels the wonder
Of the spell which it lies under
In that light so soft and tender.

While the moon her watch is keeping
All the blossoms here are sleeping,
And the roses sigh for dreaming
Of the bees that love to love them
When the warm sun shines above them
And the butterflies pass gleaming.

Could one follow roses' fancies,
When the night the garden trances.
Oh, what fair things we should chance on!
For to lilies and to roses,
As to us, soft sleep discloses
What the waking may not glance on.

But hark! now across the moonlight,
Through the warmness of the June night,
From the tall trees' listening branches,
Comes the sound, sustained and holy.
Of the passionate melancholy,
Of a wound which singing stanches.

Oh, the ecstasy of sorrow
Which the music seems to borrow
From the thought of some past lover
Who loved vainly all his lifetime.
Till death ended peace and strife-time,
And the darkness clothed him over!

Oh, the passionate, sweet singing.
Aching, gushing, throbbing, ringing.
Dying in divine, soft closes,
Recommencing, waxing stronger.
Sweet notes, ever sweeter, longer,
Till the singing wakes the roses!

Quoth the roses to the singer:
"Oh, thou dearest music-bringer,
Now our sleep so sweetly endeth,
Tell us why thy song so sad seems,
When the air is full of glad dreams,
And the bright moon o'er us bendeth."

Sang the singer to the roses:
"Love for you my song discloses,
Hence the note of grief it borrows."
Quoth the roses, "Love means pleasure."
Quoth the singer, "Love's best measure
Is its pure attendant sorrows."

1. After Summer
2. A Castle in Spain
3. The Two Burdens
4. In Memory of Arthur O’Shaughnessy

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