Sin is a crimson rose
Petaled upon a thorn,
Whose beauty fairest glows
In its first morn.
But soon (dost know how soon?)
Its petals fall apart;
And comes the high, hot noon
To scorch its heart.
The bloom dies in a day;
Yet petals, fair at morn,
Leave as they fall away,
One deathless thorn.
“The Petaled Thorn” as it appears in Higginson’s When the Birds Go North Again (1898).