A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass

Petals

          Life is a stream
          On which we strew
          Petal by petal the flower of our heart;
          The end lost in dream,
          They float past our view,
          We only watch their glad, early start.

          Freighted with hope,
          Crimsoned with joy,
          We scatter the leaves of our opening rose;
          Their widening scope,
          Their distant employ,
          We never shall know.  And the stream as it flows
          Sweeps them away,
          Each one is gone
          Ever beyond into infinite ways.
          We alone stay
          While years hurry on,
          The flower fared forth, though its fragrance still stays.