Nor peace within nor calm around,
Nor that content surpassing wealth
The sage in meditation found,
And walked with inward glory crowned--
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.
Others I see whom these surround--
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;--
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure";

so that

"I could lie down like a tired child,
And weep away the life of care."

The aching weariness that throbs in the music of these verses
is not mere sentimental self-pity; it is the cry of a soul that
has known moments of bliss when it has been absorbed in the sea
of beauty that surrounds it, only the moments pass, and the
reunion, ever sought, seems ever more hopeless. Over and over
again Shelley's song gives us both the fugitive glimpses and
the mystery of frustration.

"I sang of the dancing stars,
I sang of the daedal Earth,
And of Heaven--and the giant wars,
And Love, and Death, and Birth,--
And then I changed my pipings,--
Singing how down the vale of Menalus
I pursued a maiden and clasp'd a reed:
Gods and men, we are all deluded thus!