There is a verse in Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat:

....Like snow upon the desert's dusty face,
Lighting a little hour or two -- is gone.

I found this idea very similar to a couple of lines from Burns' Tam o' Shanter:

And like the snow falls in a river,
A moment white then melts forever.

Burns obviously hadn't read Omar Khayyam (or vice versa!) but I think it illustrates great poets can express similar thoughts in isolation.