Classic Poem

With the flowry Crowned Spring
Now the Vernal Rose we sing;
Sons of mirth, your sprightly layes
Mix with ours, to sound its praise:
Rose, the Gods and Mens 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 Loves Queen proclaim:
This relief 'gainst sickness lends;
This the very dead befriends;
This Times Malice doth prevent,
Old retains its Youthful Scent.
When Cythera from the Main,
Pallas sprung from Jove 's crackt Brain,
Then the Rose receiv'd it's Birth
From the youthful teeming Earth;
Every God was its Protector,
Watring it by turns with Nectar,
Till from Thorns it grew, and prov'd
Of Lyaeus the belov'd.