I MAY walk until I’m fainting, I may write until I’m blinded,
    I might drink until my back teeth are afloat;
But I can’t forget my ruin and the happy days behind it,
    When I wore a pink carnation in my coat.

O I thought that time could conquer, and I thought my heart would harden;
    But it sends a sodden lump into my throat
When I think of what I have been, and the cottage and the garden,
    When I wore a pink carnation in my coat.

God forgive you, girl, and bless you! let no line of mine distress you—
    I am sorry for the bitter lines I wrote;
But remember, and think kindly, for we met and married blindly,
    When I wore the pink carnation in my coat.