Dear Devotee of Sadness—²
Unhappy verse: witnesse of my Unhappie state—³
Unhappiness Pollutes not only our inner being and
All those ‘round us—but also the Collective human psyche.⁴
Nae daffing, nae gabbing, but Sighing & Sabbing!⁵
Variable passions throng our constant Woe—⁶
The familiar surroundings
Haven’t darkened for all our Grief,
Nor sickened for all our Pain.⁷
We’re filled with a Sadness—
That is yet Blessed and without bitterness.⁸
Sorrow lingers making our Soul Soil deep.⁹
We’re proud of our sadness:
It means we are more Alive!¹⁰
¹ John Milton, Il Penseroso
² Hermann Hesse tr. Richard & Clara Winston, Magister Ludi
³ Edmund Spenser, Iambicum Trimetrum
⁴ Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
⁵ Jane Elliot, A Lament for Flodden
⁶ William Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis
⁷ Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles
⁸ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
⁹ Bell Hooks, Appalachian Elegy 50
¹⁰ Don Hertzfeldt, World of Tomorrow