White-leafd or red,     

       None knows which colour     

       Till it is dead:     

       White gives forth fragrance     

       Pure as God's breath;     

       Red in its dying     

       Yields the gatherer death.     

 [Leonardo da Vinci speaks] 

       So 'tis Lorenzo's song they sing to-night,     

       That haunting song which long years since he sang     

       When, with his gallants through the torch-     

       smirched dusk,     

       He laughing rode toward the Carnival,     

       And young girls loosened all abroad their hair     

       And flung up petals through the cool moonlight,     

       Some of which falling rested on his face,     

       Some of which falling covered up his eyes;     

       And girls there were who kissed his drooping     

       hands     

       And clasped his stirrups, begging him to stay,     

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