Ode to a Nightingale

my heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
my sense, as though of hemlock i had drunk,
or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
one minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
but being too happy in thine happiness, --
that thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
in some melodious plot
of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
singest of summer in full-throated ease.

o, for a draught of vintage! that hath been
cool'd a long age in the deep-delved earth,
tasting of Flora and the country green,
dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth,
o for a beaker full of warm south,
full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
with beaded bubbles winking at the brim,
and purple-stained mouth;
that i might drink, and leave the world unseen,
and with thee fade away into the forest dim:

John Keats, may 1819.

i left authorship tutorial feeling, for lack of a better word -- enlightened, but very much depressed. why the mind works in such wondrous ways by letting inspiration flow through one second and gone the next? why is it so that Romantic poets lead unusually unpleasant lifestyles much to the likes of today's rockers and models with drugs? why is it so that when a writer wants to pen down his/her thoughts that it is when it dissipates? why let john keats experience the state of ecstasy through the song of the nightingale and then let him fall back into a rut again? there are to may whys, too many unanswered questions.

these two are my favourite stanzas of the 8 of the poem. the last stanza is too disturbingly depressing for my liking. wouldn't it be nice if there were no unhappiness like deaths and illnesses? but then again, how were we to experience, feel and understand happiness if there was no unhappiness to contrast it with? black always need its white.

disturbing.