Long considered symbolic of love and sensuality, the rose is the most poetic—and treasured—of flowers. The rose is celebrated here in verses by Edgar Allan Poe ("To Helen"), Emily Brontë ("Love and Friendship"), William Shakespeare (Sonnet 54), Christina Rossetti ("An October Garden"), Elizabeth Barrett Browning ("Song"), and John Keats ("To a Friend Who Sent Me Some Roses"). No less an inspiration to painters, the rose is also featured here in art by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Lawrence Alma-Tadema, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and others.