The Sick Rose

Another poem mentioned in the novel is William Blake's "The Sick Rose": it was in a poetry anthology that August had given Deborah, after her escape from T-Ray. The book eventually ends up in Lily's hands, when August hands her her mother's possessions:

"O Rose, thou art sick!

The invisible worm

That flies in the night,

In the howling storm,

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy:

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy."