Classic Poem

Ah ! why so tardy, timid Rose,
Thy opening beauties to display?
Ah! why within their mossy cell
So long thy shrinking petals stay?

Full many a morn, and many an eve,
Thy gently swelling bud I've seen,
And fondly strove, with many a kiss,
To wake thee from thy bed of green.

When, scarcely formed, you first appeared,
I marked thee with a lover's eye,
And doomed thee to an envied fate—
On Delia's breast to live and die.

Spring's golden smile now gilds the plain,
And chases Winter's frown away;
To thee, O Rose! she fondly calls,
And pours on thee her warmest ray.

Already doth her golden smile
My Delia's glowing beauties grace;
Already hath her pencil bright
Tinged with its radiant hue her face.

With that same hue, O happy Rose,
She longs thy velvet leaves to tip,
And breathe on them the same perfume
She breathed on Delia's dewy lip.

Near thee the lately wakened bees,
Anxious to taste thy beauties, stay;
With me thy promised bloom they wait,
And wonder at thy long delay.

Then haste, and when, with anxious step,
Thy growth to mark, I next shall walk,
Then let me see thy blushing head
Bend with its dewy weight thy stalk.