Here, in a land where hardly a rose is,

Silkiest blossoms of broidered flowers

Brush my cheek as each tired eye closes,

Haunt my sleep through the desolate hours.

Roses never of nature’s making,

Roses loved for a rose-red night,

Roses visioned at dawn-light’s breaking

Veiling a bosom as roses white!

Why does the ghost of you linger and stay with me—

Ghost of the rose-buds that perfumed our bed,

Ghost of a rose-girl who blossomed to play with me—

Here in a land where the roses are dead?

Day-time and night-time the death-flower blazes,

Saffron at gun-lip and orange and red,

Here where June’s rose-tree lies shattered as May’s is,

Here where I dream of the nights that are dead—

Nights that were sweet with the scent and the touch of you,

Growl of the guns cannot shatter the dream of you,

Banish the thought of one exquisite hour,

Or the scent of your hair in the dawn, or the gleam of you

White as white roses through roses a-flower.