Love comes unseen; we only see it go

For I respectfully decline
To dignify the Serpentine,
And make hors-d'oeuvres for fishes.

The ladies of St James's!
They're painted to the eyes,
Their white it stays for ever,
Their red it never dies:
But Phyllida, my Phyllida!
Her colour comes and goes;
It trembles to a lily,
It wavers to a rose.

And I wove the thing to a random rhyme,
For the Rose is Beauty, the Gardener, Time.

Time goes, you say? Ah, no! Alas, Time stays, we go.

All passes. Art alone/ Enduring stays to us;/ The bust outlasts the throne