Love and Friendship -- Emily Bronte

Love is like the wild rose-briar;
Friendship like the holly-tree.
The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms,
But which will bloom most constantly?

The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring,
Its summer blossoms scent the air;
Yet wait till winter comes again,
And who will call the wild-briar fair?

Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now,
And deck thee with the holly's sheen,
That, when December blights thy brow,
He still may leave thy garland green.

Isabela,

Love is like the wild rose-briar;
Friendship like the holly-tree.

The Rose-briar flowers during the summer, but it fades in the winter and dies. The Holly is evergreen.  As she says, "But which will bloom most constantly?" This is the key to the poem.

Emily Bronte is basically saying that Friendship is better than Love because like the Holly it lasts, whereas lovers can fall out of love as easily as they fell in love. So she tells the reader to favour the Holly over the Rose-briar. She also seems to be saying that when you age and lose your beautiful looks, Love is less likely, but real Friendship endures.

The Rose is a traditional symbol of Love, certainly in Britain, I don't know for sure about elsewhere. Emily Bronte may use the Rose-briar as a symbol of love because the flower is beautiful, but the briar is thorny. So Love is shown as being both as lovely as the flower but can also hurt with its thorns.

This is however an odd kind of reading because while the holly is evergreen - constant, it is also painfully sharp.

A wonderful poem - I hadn' t heard it before. I am very much into poetry of that kind. Love or friendship is like a flower that has to be cared for - usually this is the context in which these concepts are used in poems. The comparison between the holly and friendship means that friendship is ever lasting while love comes and goes. This is definitely true - at least for the experiences I had in my life so far!