TASTE the sweetness of delaying,
Till the hour shall come for saying
That I love you with my soul;
Have you never thought your heart
Finds a something in the part,
It would miss from out the whole?
In this rosebud you have given,
Sleeps that perfect rose of heaven
That in Fancy’s garden blows;
Wake it not by touch or sound,
Lest, perchance, ’t were lost, not found,
In the opening of the rose.
Dear to me is this reflection
Of a fair and far perfection,
Shining through a veil undrawn;
Ask no question then of fate;
Yet a little longer wait
In the beauty of the dawn.
Through our mornings, veiled and tender,
Shines a day of golden splendor,
Never yet fulfilled by day;
Ah! if-love be made complete,
Will it, can it, be so sweet
As this ever sweet delay?
Louisa Bushnell.