It may be misery not to sing at all
And silently changes mood everyday.
It may be sorrow never to be loved,
But deeper grief than this troubled way.

I have to sing the perfect song
And by a half-note I lost the key,
And there’s the pain, a crippling sorrow,
The path, sad string of life’s problem.

To have just missed the perfect love,
Not the hot passion of unprepared youth,
But that which lays aside its uselessness
And gives you a trusting value, truth

Then, this is to be blessed indeed;
If we mortals love, or if we sing,
We count our joys not by things we have,
But what kept us from the perfect thing.