Roses Are Red

Template:Short description {{#invoke:other uses|otheruses}} Template:Redirect Template:Distinguish Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox song "Roses Are Red" is a love poem and children's rhyme with Roud Folk Song Index number 19798.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It has spawned multiple humorous and parodic variants.<ref>S. J. Bronner, American Children's Folklore (August House: 1988), p. 84.</ref>

A modern standard version is:<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

<poem>Roses are red

Violets are blue, Sugar is sweet And so are you.</poem>{{#if:|

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Origins

The rhyme builds on poetic conventions that are traceable as far back as Edmund Spenser's epic The Faerie Queene of 1590:

<poem>It was upon a Sommers shynie day,

When Titan faire his beames did display, In a fresh fountaine, farre from all mens vew, She bath'd her brest, the boyling heat t'allay; She bath'd with roses red, and violets blew, And all the sweetest flowres, that in the forrest grew.<ref>Spenser, The Faery Queene iii, Canto 6, Stanza 6: on-line text Template:Webarchive</ref></poem>{{#if:|

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A rhyme similar to the modern standard version can be found in Gammer Gurton's Garland, a 1784 collection of English nursery rhymes published in London by Joseph Johnson:<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

<poem>The rose is red, the violet's blue,

The honey's sweet, and so are you. Thou are my love and I am thine; I drew thee to my Valentine: The lot was cast and then I drew, And Fortune said it shou'd be you.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref></poem>{{#if:|

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