A Lovely Rose in the poem Song by Edmund Waller

A detailed Summary of A Lovely Rose in the poem Song by Edmund Waller

For many centuries, young men have been telling their sweethearts about ephemeral youth and passion which, like a candle, burns brightly but dies out slowly but surely. Edmund Waller's persona in the poem "Song" is such a young man. He sends a rose to his beloved to "Tell her that [she] wastes her time and [him] (2) by acting shy and staying out of sight. This young lover is trying to tell his paramour that their time is too short for such petty things. He is telling her to forget society and let her feelings lead the way. The speaker of this poem wants his mistress to understand this eagerness of his, and drop everything and come running to enjoy their momentary love.

In the first stanza, the young lover is commanding a rose to go and deliver a message of the urgency of his love to his sweetheart. He commands the rose to tell her that she is wasting their precious youth by acting ignorant when she knows that he admires her. He "resembles her to [the rose]" (4), and discovers "How sweet and fair she seems to be" (5). He uses the rose as a symbol of her beauty. He compares her to the rose because roses are beautiful things that last only for a certain time. By this comparison, he wants her to see the evanescence of

In the second stanza, the speaker is commanding the rose to tell his paramour to throw off her robe of modesty and show off her beauty while she can. He understands that she is young "And shuns to have her graces spied" (7), but he wants the world to see her beauty and admire her for it. He wants to walk into a room with his beautiful mistress and see the men fighting for a glance at her and the women envying from afar. He wants poems written about her beauty and ballads sung about her virtue. Thus, he sends the lovely rose. He sends her the rose so she can admire its beauty, and, by doing so, she will be admiring herself. He commands the rose to tell her that if it had "sprung / In deserts, where no men abide" (8-9), then the rose "must have uncommended died" (10). By asking the rose to tell her this, the speaker is illustrating that hidden beauty such as hers needs to be praised. Otherwise, the loveliness will fade without fulfilling its purpose: in life to be admired and praised. The young lover is showing her how cruel she is for trying to hide her beauty. He wants her to see that just as she gets pleasure from admiring the rose, he gets pleasure from admiring her. So he sends her the lovely rose as a reminder of her beauty.

The speaker, in the third stanza, is commanding the rose to go "Bid her come forth" (13) and be the object of his admiration. He wants her to know that there is no worth in hidden beauty. What one cannot see, one cannot appreciate seems to be his philosophy. He sends

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Approximate Word count = 1025
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English