Food for thought?

I'll break my biography with little snippets like this from time to time. This is an attempt at thought provoking poetry for the monthly magazine we bring out at our college.

REQUIEM

Life's light's a flickering candle,
Burning off and on.
Now it shines with all it's strength,
Now it's dead and gone.
Onward it shines through ups and downs,
This flickering ray still glows,
Traipsing through troubles, piercing darkness,
Serenity it silently shows.
Through long years this light persists,
This candle in the rain.
Riding roughshod over hill and valley,
Enduring all the pain,
'Til the hour of death and darkness,
When the light no longer glows,
The soul transcends to heaven and the body lies
In rest, requiem, repose.