Misalliance

The fragrant honeysuckle spirals clockwise to the sun
And many other creepers do the same
But some climb anti-clockwise: the bindweed does, for one
Or Convolvulus, to give her proper name
Rooted on either side of a door, one of each species grew
And raced towards the window-ledge above
Each corkscrewed to the lintel in the only way it knew
Where they stopped, touchеd tendrils, smiled, and fell in lovе

Said the right-handed honeysuckle to the left-handed bindweed
"Oh, let us get married! If our parents don't mind, we’d
Be loving and inseparable, inextricably entwined, we'd
Live happily ever after," said the honeysuckle to the bindweed

To the honeysuckle's parents it came as a shock
"The bindweeds," they cried, "are inferior stock!
They’re uncultivated, of breeding bereft:
We twine to the right and they twine to the left."

Said the anti-clockwise bindweed to the clockwise honeysuckle:
"We'd better start saving -- many a mickle maks a muckle
Then run away for a honeymoon and hope that our luck'll
Take a turn for the better," said the bindweed to the honeysuckle

A bee who was passing remarked to them then
"I've said it before and I'll say it again:
Consider your offshoots, if offshoots there be:
They'll never receive any blessing from me
"Poor little sucker, how will it learn
When it is climbing, which way to turn?
Right, left, what a disgrace!
Or it may go straight up and fall flat on its face!"

Said the right-hand-thread honeysuckle to the left-hand-thread bindweed
"It seems that against us all fate has combined
Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling columbine
Thou art lost and gone forever. We shall never intertwine."

Together, they found them, the very next day:
They had pulled up their roots and just shrivelled away
Deprived of that freedom for which we must fight
To veer to the left or to veer to the right!