How do you hold a rose?

How do you hold a rose?
A precious and beautiful treasure
When it's pressed into fingers, gently it clings there
Thorns quietly pricking into the skin

How do you tear apart your heart?
Such a valuable, vulnerable thing?
And offer it to others besides fathers, brothers, sisters, mothers?
In their tight grips, your heart will rend.

And what will you do when she takes off?
And wanders away with the thing?
Her vice-like clamp tugging each time that you see
She's thrown your red offerings down to the gutters

How do you hold a rose?
Do you cut into fingers so it may not dislodge,
Slice into flesh when you pull it from your palms
Study it, say "Nay, this rose I cannot keep.
It's no rose of mine; it's another's joy."
But despite all of this, offer it your heart
Though you know it will prick, you just cannot stop
For a treasure this precious just cannot be left
Though this flower rose to root in some other's chest
Leaving nothing in you but thorns where beauty grew
Memories of happiness... "Once upon a time, not so long ago..."
So when ever you reach in to remember sweet love
Your hand returns bleeding from what once was a home

How do you hold a rose?
A precious and beautiful treasure
When it's pressed into your heart, then tears you apart
Once it's left you to bloom somewhere else