Waking or asleep, thou of death must deem things more true and deep than we mortals dream, or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?
We look before and after, and pine for what is not: our sincerest laughter with some pain is fraught; our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
Yet, if we could scorn hate and pride and fear, if we were things born not to shed a tear, I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.
– From “To a Skylark” by Percy Bysshe Shelley