A Dream Within A Dream
Edgar Allan Poe

 Take this kiss upon the brow!

 And, in parting from you now,

 Thus much let me avow-

 You are not wrong, who 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?