O let me gather the roses instead,
The young little roses the first and best.'
Soft summer twilights caressing the air
Have buried the garden in lovely gloom;
But I knew that the eagerest roses there
Were just beginning to think they might bloom.
The pretty wee stars kept peeping about,
And even peep'd in through our prison bars,
As she gravely said, 'Who ever went out
To gather a rose by the light of stars?'