This is the tragedy: Consciousness has forced us into the paradoxical position of striving to be unself-conscious of what we are — hunks of spoiling flesh on disintegrating bones.
“Like beautiful bodies of the dead who had not grown old
and they shut them, with tears, in a brilliant mausoleum,
with roses at the head and jasmine at the feet –
this is what desires resemble that have passed
without fulfillment; without any of them having achieved
a night of sensual delight, or a morning of brightness.”
Constantine P. Cavafy