LAST YEAR’S ROSES.

They are only last year’s roses In my mother’s china jar, But their faint and subtle fragrance Wafts me back to days afar; And I shut my eyes a moment, And I see my mother pace Up and down the garden borders With her stately old-world grace, While she plucks the perfumed petals Beds of glowing bloom among— Oh, the roses, those sweet roses, That I knew when I was young! They are only last year’s roses In the old blue china jar, But I hear my mother singing Songs I loved in days afar: Yes, you sing amongst your roses, And I grant them fresh and fair, But they are not quite so fragrant As those old-world roses were; And your songs are not as sweet, dear, As the songs my mother sung, And you cannot make pot-pourri As they used—when I was young!