Withered Rose Quotes & Sayings

The plants in the garden - the aloes, the almond tree, the rose tree and the iris - were afraid of her. The flowers withered under her breath and the touch of her hand was leprous for the leaves. The plants whose growth is belief, whose breathing is hope, whose immobility is confidence and whose calyx is prayer, the plants who kept watch into the night, hated this women with the secret force of stars. — Hendrik Cramer

He was looking at Mr. Nancy, an old black man with a pencil moustache, in his check sports jacket and his lemon yellow gloves, riding a carousel lion as it rose and lowered, high in the air; and, at the same time, in the same place, he saw a jeweled spider as high as a horse, its eyes an emerald nebula, strutting, staring down at him; and simultaneously he was looking at an extraordinarily tall man with teak colored skin and three sets of arms, wearing a flowing ostrich-feather headdress, his face painted with red stripes, riding an irritated golden lion, two of his six hands holding on tightly to the beast's mane; and he was also seeing a young black boy, dressed in rags, his left foot all swollen and crawling with black flies; and last of all, and behind all these things, Shadow was looking at a tiny brown spider, hiding under a withered ochre leaf. Shadow saw all these things, and he knew they were the same thing. — Neil Gaiman

Like the withered roses of a once gay garland, the feelings of youth command in age a melancholy interest. — Christian Nestell Bovee

One day when I ventured into the garden to regard its bloom,
My eyes beheld on a bower a withered rose.
When I inquired what had caused the blight,
"My lips for a moment opened in a smile in this garden," it replied. — Musharraf Ali Farooqi

Come with me, come with me,
Come with me, for these limbs are meek
Which hold together time's encumbered knee;
Which playfully caress its withered cheek;
Come with me until the Muezzin is done calling,
Come with me until the moon is done strolling,
Come with me until the rains appear in summer,
Come with me until these rose faces turn glummer,
Come with me unto the end of this rhyme,
Come with me unto the birth of that chime,
Come with me, come with me,
Come with me and with my impertinent plea. — Ashfaq Saraf

Still I sojourn here, alone and palely loitering, though the sedge is withered from the lake and no birds sing. For I sent the bath towel to the wash this morning, and omitted to put out another. I have no towel. — Rose Macaulay

Wish that they could walk forever
On the earth alone and fettered
Until they pray for consolation
Until they beg for sweet damnation
Then I'll come and bring them water
Bring them hope, bring them laughter
Raise their hopes both sad and sunken
Slash them up as they lie there drunken
Push them down into the foul mud
Until they choke up on their own blood
Drag them out before their last breath
To take away the mercy of death
Mother's eyes are sparking diamonds
Still the moon shows no light
This rose is withered
May God deliver
The rake at the gates of hell tonight — Shane MacGowan

Who gathers the withered rose? — William Faulkner

You come in the day of destiny,
Barbara, born to the air of Mars:
The greater glory you shall see
And the greater peace, beyond these wars.
In other days within this isle,
As in a temple, men knew peace;
And won the world to peace a while
Till rose the pride of Rome and Greece,
The pride of art, the pride of power,
The cruel empire of the mind:
Withered the light like a summer flower,
And hearts went cold and souls went blind;
And, groping, men took other gifts,
And thought them the best:
But the light lives in the soul that lifts
The quiet love above the rest. — Thomas MacDonagh

Then the Unlight of Ungoliant rose up even to the roots of the trees, and Melkor sprang upon the mound; and with his black spear he smote each Tree to its core, wounded them deep, and their sap poured forth as it were their blood, and was spilled upon the ground. But Ungoliant sucked it up, and going then from Tree to Tree she set her black beak to their wounds, till they were drained; and the poison of Death that was in her went into their tissues and withered them, root, branch, and leaf; and they died. And still she thirsted, and going to the Wells of Varda she drank them dry; but Ungoliant belched forth black vapours as she drank, and swelled to a shape so vast and hideous that Melkor was afraid. — J.R.R. Tolkien