What knows a bride of the bliss of a wife?
Are all things the dearer for growing old?
As flowers are sweeter deep in a wood;
Will the warmth of May in July seem cold?
Was earth less perfect when God call'd it 'good'?
Even roses when young are only green,
And the exquisite perfume faint and small,
If roses are lovely when just half seen,
When blown they are sweetest and best of all.
Time passes on, and they open too much;