SHALL that bright flower the countless ages toiled
And travailed to bring forth — shall that rare rose,
Whose bloom and fragrance earth and heaven unclose
Their treasuries to enrich, by death be foiled?
Its matchless splendor trampled down and spoiled?
Shall that Celestial Love — who watched its throes
Through centuries of long struggles and of woes,
And freed it from the old Serpent round it coiled;
Who tended it, and reared its glorious head
Above the brambles and the poisonous marsh,
And shielded it when zones were cased in ice —
Leave it to perish when the summons harsh
Of death is rung, — or, ere its leaves are shed,
Transplant it to his realm of Paradise?