Poetry Archives

A continuing selection of classic and contemporary poems.

Christina Rossetti

A million buds are born that never blow,
  That sweet with promise lift a pretty head
  To blush and wither on a barren bed
    And leave no fruit to show.

Sweet, unfulfilled. Yet have I understood
  One joy, by their fragility made plain:
  Nothing was ever beautiful in vain,
    Or all in vain was good.

Online text © 1998-2008 Poetry X. All rights reserved.
From Poems | Little, Brown, and Company, 1906

What are tags?
Tags, sometimes called “folksonomies,” are words that describe or categorize a poem, like “20th century modernism” or “Italian sonnet”. Tags can help you find poems that have something in common, based on how other people classify them.

« Previous