The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose.
He wears the rose Of youth upon him.
But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd Than that which withering on the virgin thorn Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness.
Their lips were four red roses on a stalk.
I'll say she looks as clear as morning roses newly washed with dew.
At Christmas, I no more desire a rose.
Of all the flowers, me thinks a rose is best.
My early prose style - this is so embarrassing - was sort of a suburban, Presbyterian knockoff of Woody Allen.
My affinity, as a novelist, with Dickens has been overstated. I relish the way everything in his prose pulsates with life force, and I'm in debt to him every time I invest inanimate objects with uncanny animism. But his female characters annoy me.
Can I have a silk nightgown with rosebuds on it?