Matthew

“Almost he slept again. Sorrow, sorrow, sorrow. Not sorrow, he thought, though when he remembered Seven Girls Waiting and Pink Butterflies and the living, thinking tree ruling kindly its little lake and flowered lawn in the country of sliding stones, something hurt. Sorrow, sorrow, sorrow, sang the night wind, throbbing. Not sorrow, Sandwalker thought to himself, hate. The marshmen had killed Flying Feet, who had sometimes out of his plenty given him to eat when he was small. They would kill Bloodyfinger and Leaves-you-can-eat, Sweetmouth and his mother. Sorrow, sing sorrow. Not sorrow, he thought, the wind, the tree. He sat up, listening to convince himself that it was only the sighing of the wind he heard, or perhaps the tree murmuring of better places. Whatever it was—perhaps, indeed, he had been wrong about this lonely, reed-hemmed tree—it was not an angry sound. It was … nothing. The lost wind sighed, but not in words. The leaves around him scarcely trembled. Far overhead and far away thunder boomed. Sorrow, sang many voices. Sorrow, sorrow, sorrow. Loneliness, and the night coming that will never go.”
― Gene Wolfe, The Fifth Head of Cerberus