Arthur Symons - Nerves lyrics

The modern malady of love is nerves. Love, once a simple madness, now observes The stages of his pa**ionate disease, And is twice sorrowful because he sees, Inch by inch entering, the fatal knife. O health of simple minds, give me your life, And let me, for one midnight, cease to hear The clock for ever ticking in my ear, The clock that tells the minutes in my brain. It is not love, nor love's despair, this pain That shoots a witless, keener pang across The simple agony of love and loss. Nerves, nerves! O folly of a child who dreams Of heaven, and, waking in the darkness, screams.