In the Time of the Rose

Now that the crimson rose is queen once more,
There stirs within my heart the keen desire
To see the morning touch with golden fire
The slender minarets by the Pharpar shore;
To tread the byways that I trod of yore
Amid the chaffering merchants come from Tyre,
Beyrout and Bagdad, and to hear the choir
Of passionate bulbuls at the night's dim door.

Thus doth the rose impel me, being kin
To blooms I plucked in gardens Damascene
In bygone days when all the earth seemed fair;
And through the dreams that I am tangled in
Glides one with her bewitching orient mien,
The rose of love red-woven in her hair!