Winter Rose

Wild roses grew untended by the old churchyard wall

I would steal there by evening

And give names to them all

Their petals, to my hands, were soft as her face

And the moon, like your love, dear

Lent everything grace

There were angels of stone, the churchyard their keep

I would steal there alone

Just to sit silently

Their wings were of stone, and that's why they wept

And still like the angels

My vigil I kept

My mother lamented the loss of her child

While I, like the roses,

Untended grew wild

My love came too late to the old churchyard wall

Not I nor the angels

Can hear my love call

My love is an angel in form and in face

She weeps in the churchyard,

Our trysting place

The winter's white beauty can smother and kill

And I, like the churchyard,

Am silent and still.

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