• Most would say it's dead.
    But then why would it be ahead
    Of all the other roses?
    Thought Brother Moses.

    Brother Moses' wife
    Had left him for another life.
    The only way he could remember her
    Was to do her gardening through the dirt.

    Now he saw her rose garden
    In one of the backyards of Harlem.
    Almost all of them were red and bright
    But the black rose was in center sight.

    He thought for a moment of taking it away
    In the garbage can, it might have lay.
    But Brother Moses
    Saw all beauty in roses.
    Including black roses
    That need color-doses.

    He saw that the beauty of the black rose
    Was much more special than most.
    So he bent his back and got on his knees
    And charged for the black rose, through thorns and leaves.

    That very same day he visited his wife's grave,
    With the black rose in his hand, He had that day in May.
    That special rose, did he lay
    In the ground on his wife's grave.

    Brother Moses visits the black rose every day
    Since that morning in May.
    Now, he doesn't see one black rose
    But he sees his wife tending black roses.