ENTER THE U.S. POLITICS ONLINE DISCUSSION FORUM
Note: The text below is in the public domain. This text is offered to the general public for non-profit educational purposes. U.S. Politics Online does not own any copyrights pertaining to the text. Any copyrights that may exist as to the format, translation, etc., resides with the respective author/formatter, not U.S. Politics Online. U.S. Politics Online did convert the original text file into html. Any errors with respect to formatting is a result of a program used to automate the process.
Due to the requirements for redistribution of this text by some of the sources, the original source from which I obtained the text at times will not be disclosed. If you would like information with respect to where I obtained the text then please send me an e-mail: archives@uspoliticsonline.com. Such sources are not liable in any way for the text here. I would simply provide you with information where you can find the original text of the document, which may or may not be identical to what you see here. I have made every attempt to comply with the wishes of the sources of these documents. If an error is found with respect to such compliance then please bring it to my attention immediately so the matter can be resolved.
Also, if you are the person responsible for converting the text to the electronic format and would like credit for your work in the document, please e-mail me and I would be more than happy to comply. Due to my conversion of these text documents into the html format and the possibility for errors to occur in said conversion, I did not want to inadvertently attribute such errors to you.
1827
DREAMS
by Edgar Allan Poe
DREAMS
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.
-THE END-
.