There is a legend about a bird which sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine.
And, dying, it rises above its own agony to outcarol the lark and the nightingale.
One superlative song, existence the price.
But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles.
For the best is only bought at the cost of great pain….
Or so says the legend.
I feel sick. Not like for a doctor, but inside my chest it feels empty, like getting punched and a heartburn at the same time.
To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love. But then one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness. I hope you're getting this down.
No man is offended by another man's admiration of the woman he loves; it is the woman only who can make it a torment.
When I say it doesn’t hurt me, that means I can bear it.
How torture is torture and humiliation is humiliation only when you choose to suffer.