"I pursu'd a maiden and clasp'd a reed"

I sang of the dancing stars,
I sang of the daedal Earth,
And of Heaven, and the giant wars,
And Love, and Death, and Birth—
And then I chang'd my pipings,
Singing how down the vale of Maenalus
I pursu'd a maiden and clasp'd a reed.
Gods and men, we are all deluded thus!
It breaks in our bosom and then we bleed.
All wept, as I think both ye now would,
If envy or age had not frozen your blood,
At the sorrow of my sweet pipings.

From "Hymn of Pan" by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822). Complete text at Poetry Foundation

Pan and Syrinx, Peter Paul Rubens, 1617-1619. Image from Web Gallery of Art.

Myth of Pan and Syrinx