With the flowery crowned spring
Now the vernal rose we sing;
Sons of mirth, your sprightly lays
Mix with ours, to sound its praise:
Rose, the gods' and men's sweet flower;
Rose, the Graces' paramour:
This of Muses the delight,
This is Venus' favourite;
Sweet, when guarded by sharp thorns;
Sweet, when it soft hands adorns;
How at mirthful boards admir'd!
How at Bacchus' feasts desir'd!
Fair without it what is born?
Rosy-finger'd is the Morn;
Rosy-arm'd the nymphs we name;
Rosy-cheek'd Love's queen proclaim:
This relief 'gainst sickness lends;
This the very dead befriends;
This Time's malice doth prevent,
Old retains its youthful scent.
When Cythera from the main,
Pallas sprung from Jove's crack'd brain,
Then the rose receiv'd its birth
From the youthful teeming earth;
Every god was its protector,
Wat'ring it by turns with nectar,
Till from thorns it grew, and prov'd
Of Lyæus the belov'd.
