Elixir

What is this which I carry in my veins,
Elixir made of sunlight and of sorrow,
Throbbing with my breath against the dark world’s stains
To keep the sunlight burning till tomorrow?
Against the days of darkness I shall borrow
All the gold the sunlight deigns
To gift me, shall transmute it through the narrow
Beating of my heart, where my life still remains--
Eternal flame which knows not time.  The sparrow
Scarcely knows what fire her flight sustains.