Dreams

Edgar Allan Poe

Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!

 My spirit not awakening, till the beam

 Of an Eternity should bring the morrow.

 Yes! tho' that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,

 'Twere better than the cold reality

 Of waking life, to him whose heart must be,

 And hath been still, upon the lovely earth,

 A chaos of deep passion, from his birth.

 But should it be- that dream eternally

 Continuing- as dreams have been to me

 In my young boyhood- should it thus be given,

 'Twere folly still to hope for higher Heaven.

 For I have revell'd, when the sun was bright

 I' the summer sky, in dreams of living light

 And loveliness,- have left my very heart

 In climes of my imagining, apart

 From mine own home, with beings that have been

 Of mine own thought- what more could I have seen?

 'Twas once- and only once- and the wild hour

 From my remembrance shall not pass- some power

 Or spell had bound me- 'twas the chilly wind

 Came o'er me in the night, and left behind

 Its image on my spirit- or the moon

 Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon

 Too coldly- or the stars- howe'er it was

 That dream was as that night-wind- let it pass.

 I have been happy, tho' in a dream.

 I have been happy- and I love the theme:

 Dreams! in their vivid coloring of life,

 As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife

 Of semblance with reality, which brings

 To the delirious eye, more lovely things

 Of Paradise and Love- and all our own!

 Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.