Summary

The speaker considers the mental and emotional divide they feel as one half of them remains in the mortal world, while the other half is away in fairyland. They imagine their spirit wandering through fairyland, meeting a fairy woman who seduces them and entraps their loyalty. One day, however, the fairy woman gets tired of the speaker and casts them aside. The speaker’s discarded heart is then collected by a group of motley fairies. The other fairies take the speaker’s heart and stretch it into four strings, which they use to string a violin. They play strange and sad songs on the violin, which cause anyone who hears them to dance until they collapse.

The speaker looks back on their life, in which they have felt split apart with one half of them away in fairyland. Around them, they see “single-souled” people...