Bulb Planting Time by Edgar Guest Lyrics

Last night he said the dead were dead
        And scoffed my faith to scorn;
I found him at a tulip bed
        When I passed by at morn.

"O ho!" said I, "the frost is near
        And mist is on the hills,
And yet I find you planting here
        Tulips and daffodils."

"'Tis time to plant them now," he said,
        "If they shall bloom in Spring";
"But every bulb," said I, "seems dead,
        And such an ugly thing."

"The pulse of life I cannot feel,
        The skin is dried and brown.
Now look!" a bulb beneath my heel
        I crushed and trampled down.

In anger then he said to me:
        "You've killed a lovely thing;
A scarlet blossom that would be
        Some morning in the Spring."
"Last night a greater sin was thine,"
        To him I slowly said;
"You trampled on the dead of mine
        And told me they are dead."