Why are all fair things at their death the fairest?
Beauty the beautifullest in decay?
Why doth rich sunset clothe each closing day
With ever-new apparelling the rarest?
Why are the sweetest melodies all born
Of pain and sorrow? Mourneth not the dove,
In the green forest gloom, an absent love?
Leaning her breast against that cruel thorn,
Doth not the nightingale, poor bird, complain
And integrate her uncontrollable woe
To such perfection, that to hear is pain?
Thus, Sorrow and Death—alone realities—
Sweeten their ministration, and bestow
On troublous life a relish of the skies!