A Dream within a Dream

[Mary]

Take this kiss upon thy brow!

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow?

You are not wrong, to deem

That my days have been a dream;

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

In a vision, or in none,

Is it therefore the less gone?

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream.

 

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,

And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand?

How few! yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep,

While I weep?while I weep!

O God! can I not grasp

Them with a tighter clasp?

O God! can I not save

One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?

 

Edgar Allen Poe

I think we have forgotten how well he wrote poetry.

[Jerry]

Forty years ago I knew a newspaperman/writer who wrote a column saying that when he lived in Baltimore (is that where Poe is buried?) he would visit his grave on the anniversary of Poe's death, and hoist a drink of tribute. Of course this guy was a bit of an alcoholic but also a romantic, n'est pas?