Melancholic

Just past 12am and I am finally feeling "better."

The last 24 hours have been superbly strange and things that would only happen to me, including getting my key for the bank depository stuck in the keyhole and having to break it off.

I've had weird sensations all day, that I'm fairly certain have to do with stock boxes falling on me and not the bottle of wine I drank to make my day seem less terrible...

I've not felt so melancholic in a very long while. Ironically, my darling friend Megan encouraged me to write and article for a contest to end up being a fashion blogger and since as she put it I "have nothing to lose!" I just finished one article (you can keep submitting so maybe?) and sent it to her to look over and edit before I send it in.

The best part is, I finally feel me again. Writing does that. It centers me and calms me in a way nothing else has ever been able to.

Now to make sure I continue to write and submit. Being active and pursuing what I want is what keeps the melancholy at bay...even if that melancholy sometimes produces my best pieces. ;)



Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.

John Keats. 1795–1821

628. Ode on Melancholy

NO, no! go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kist
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine;
Make not your rosary of yew-berries, 5
Nor let the beetle, nor the death-moth be
Your mournful Psyche, nor the downy owl
A partner in your sorrow's mysteries;
For shade to shade will come too drowsily,
And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul. 10

But when the melancholy fit shall fall
Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud,
That fosters the droop-headed flowers all,
And hides the green hill in an April shroud;
Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose, 15
Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave,
Or on the wealth of globèd peonies;
Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,
Emprison her soft hand, and let her rave,
And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes. 20

She dwells with Beauty—Beauty that must die;
And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips
Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh,
Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips:
Ay, in the very temple of Delight 25
Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine,
Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue
Can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine;
His soul shall taste the sadness of her might,
And be among her cloudy trophies hung. 30