Poem: Red is the Rose

JMJ

Red is the Rose

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2013

Note: The refrain of this piece (and the title) is taken from a song by the Clancy Brothers, to whom, I should add, I am no relative in spite of the name.  I also was inspired by and took some of the image ideas from another song – I don’t know the title – that was performed at the Arlington Diocese pro-life youth rally some years back.  To the author of that unremembered song, therefore, I also am indebted.  Additionally, I have included some of my own authorial reflections below.

Red is the Rose 

That in yonder garden grows

Fair is the lily of the valley

Clear is the water

That flows from the Boyne

And my love is fairer than any

Red was the Rose 

That Friday morn

Red was the Rose

Indeed

In its quiet corner

Of the yard

Its petals perfect

Arrayed and starred

Its slender stalk

Was jerked and jarred

By a centurion’s hand

Red was the Rose

That the soldier plucked

The bloom that ne’er

Saw night

And little did poor

Brilliant red-heart Rose

Wonder that pain

Grows and grows

As the angered crowd

Crows and crows

“The Just One, Crucify!”

Ripped from its bed

Uprooted and torn

From beauty unblossomed

Of innocence shorn

Wrapped in a loop

Thrice a curse

Round sacred Head

Punished worse

By silence

Death He would disperse –

And so the world goes on.

Red is the Rose 

That in yonder garden grows

Fair is the lily of the valley

Fast in its knot

The rose was dead

The Woman saw it

As He was led

Upon the road

Beneath the cross

The world, His weight

Their joy, Her loss

White was the Lily

Who stood and watched

White was the Lily

Indeed

And white was her veil

Who wept beside

Who fully knew

What woe betide;

She alone

Could not jeer

She alone

Had Dolors, not cheer

Who from His

First and silent year

Knew what the wise knew not.

Red is the Rose 

That in yonder garden grows

Fair is the lily of the valley

Sharp came the thrust

Into the Temple

The spear that broke the law

Hard twixt the ribs

Of the Holy of Holies

The cold metal point

Waxed raw         

Clear was the water

That flowed from the Temple

Clear was the water

Indeed

And the rose pressed hard

On the bloody wood

And the Lily wept

As no one could;

And they looked on His face

And did not remain

Knowing the Child

That they had slain

And filled their hearts

With the blood

Of Cain. 

Red is the Rose 

That in yonder garden grows

Fair is the lily of the valley

The rose, cast aside

On the hillside,

To wither, rot, decay

Blossomed one fair morning

A solemn, paschal day;

It budded and it blossomed

It lifted up its head

Never to fade or fall again

Never to shrivel

Never to sin

Never to lie cold

When the Word walks in –

As though all Hope were dead! 

Red is the Rose 

That in yonder garden grows

Fair is the lily of the valley

Clear is the water

That flows from the Boyne

And my love is fairer than any

Author's Notes:  

This poem, if it is not already obvious, centers on the Passion of Christ.  I thought that the verse of the Clancy Brother's song especially appropriate to incorporate as the images it presents fit so well with the events of the Crucifixion (for instance, the water flowing from the side of Christ, Our Lady's purity as exemplified by the lily, etc.).  Also - and I confess I got this idea from the song-mentioned-above-the-title-of-which-I-cannot-recall - that the rose may be taken as the metaphor of the individual soul and its journey.  

And for those of you who (like me) get unreasonably excited by numeric significance and the like: note that the number of stanzas (refrains excepted) comes to 12 (like the Apostles and the Tribes of Israel): five at the first, then three, three, and one.  I am not sure where the five come from, but there seems to be a kind of unconscious Trinity metaphor mixed into the latter part.  But what can I say?  It seems to me that such unintentional creations (and the numerical structure of this piece was, I avow, quite unintentional) are likely the simple and natural product of Catholic blood.