Negative Pleasure

“(the feeling of the sublime) is a pleasure that arises only indirectly, being generated, namely, by the feeling of a momentary inhibition of the vital powers and the immediately following and all the more powerful outpouring of them; hence as an emotion it seems to be not play but something serious in the activity of the imagination.” – Immanuel Kant (1724-1804).
 
He was wrong 
I looked out over the churning water 
That covered the earth forever, it seemed, 
And saw, out there, the tiny brown
Boat bob and sink and glug a bubble 
The breath held, the heart stopped 
Poised on the scumyellow foamcrest of the moment, 
Now 
And then: the world drowned in the saltdead flood of grief and terror 
And I turned my eyes  
From the sea to the seadark sky 
Shuddering