<h2><i><SPAN name="DREAMS"></SPAN>DREAMS</i></h2>
<p class="poem">
Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!<br/>
My spirit not awakening, till the beam<br/>
Of an Eternity should bring the morrow.<br/>
Yes! tho' that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,<br/>
'Twere better than the cold reality<br/>
Of waking life, to him whose heart must be,<br/>
And hath been still, upon the lovely earth,<br/>
A chaos of deep passion, from his birth.<br/>
But should it be—that dream eternally<br/>
Continuing—as dreams have been to me<br/>
In my young boyhood—should it thus be given,<br/>
'Twere folly still to hope for higher Heaven.<br/>
For I have revell'd, when the sun was bright<br/>
I' the summer sky, in dreams of living light<br/>
And loveliness,—have left my very heart<br/>
In climes of my imagining, apart<br/>
From mine own home, with beings that have been<br/>
Of mine own thought—what more could I have seen?<br/>
'Twas once—and only once—and the wild hour<br/>
From my remembrance shall not pass—some power<br/>
Or spell had bound me—'twas the chilly wind<br/>
Came o'er me in the night, and left behind<br/>
Its image on my spirit—or the moon<br/>
Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon<br/>
Too coldly—or the stars—howe'er it was<br/>
That dream was as that night-wind—let it pass.<br/>
I <i>have been</i> happy, tho' in a dream.<br/>
I have been happy—and I love the theme:<br/>
Dreams! in their vivid colouring of life,<br/>
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife<br/>
Of semblance with reality, which brings<br/>
To the delirious eye, more lovely things<br/>
Of Paradise and Love—and all our own!<br/>
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.<br/></p>
<hr class="r65" />
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