In Ovid’s version of the myth Narcissus is undone by unattainable love and withers away by the pool. The dramatic moment is one of sorrow and grief. His sisters, the Naiads, water nymphs, lament and crop their hair.
He knows not what he sees, but what he sees
invites him. Even as the pool deceives
his eyes, it tempts them with delights. But why,
o foolish boy, do you persist? Why try
to grip an image? He does not exist—
—Ovid, Metamorphoses