And all the while, for every grief,
Each suffering, I craved relief
With individual desire:
Craved all in vain, and felt fierce fire
About a thousand people crawl;
Perished with each, then mourned for all.

. . .

No hurt I did not feel, no death
That was not mine; mine each last breath
That, crying, met an answering cry
From the compassion that was I.
All suffering mine, and mine its rod;
Mine, pity like the pity of God.

—Edna St. Vincent Millay, Renascence