Songs and Sonnets (Coleman)/The Seed
THE SEED.
Scarce had my flower bloomed when one
By one its crimson petals fell;
Touched by some change inscrutable
Its life and loveliness were done.
And with it something in my heart
Suddenly passed and was no more,
As if a hand had closed the door
Where Beauty, dreaming, sat apart.
O life, O loveliness, how brief!
How soon the costly wine is spilled—
The casket sealed, the laughter stilled!
But O, how long, how endless, grief!
So musing, mourning, I complained,
When lo! a seed replaced my flower;
All that was drawn from sun and shower
In substance still to me remained.
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A voyager, this tiny barque,
That breasts the sea of change and loss,
What power fashioned it to cross
The wide abysses of the dark?
Shall not that Power in some sphere
Beyond our finite reach or ken
Bring into life and bloom again
The good we sought to fashion here?