A Dream Within A Dream
                          by 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?