DREAMSOh! that my young life were a lasting dream!My spirit not awak’ning, till the beamOf an Eternity should bring the morrow:Yes! tho’ that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,’Twere better than the dull realityOf waking life to him whose heart shall be,And hath been ever, on the chilly earth,A chaos of deep passion from his birth!But should it be—that dream eternallyContinuing—as dreams have been to meIn 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 brightIn the summer sky; in dreamy fields of light,And left unheedingly my very heartIn climes of mine imagining—apartFrom mine own home, with beings that have beenOf mine own thought—what more could I have seen?’Twas once &onlyonce & the wild hourFrom my rememberance shall not pass—some powerOr spell had bound me—’twas the chilly windCame o’er me in the night & left behindIts image on my spirit, or the moonShone on my slumbers in her lofty noonToo coldly—or the stars—howe’er it wasThat dream was as that night wind—let it pass.I have been happy—tho’ but in a dreamI have been happy—& I love the theme—Dreams! in their vivid colouring of life—As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strifeOf semblance with reality which bringsTo the delirious eye more lovely thingsOf Paradise & Love—& all our own!Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.{From an earlier MS. Than in the book—ED.}
Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!My spirit not awak’ning, till the beamOf an Eternity should bring the morrow:Yes! tho’ that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,’Twere better than the dull realityOf waking life to him whose heart shall be,And hath been ever, on the chilly earth,A chaos of deep passion from his birth!But should it be—that dream eternallyContinuing—as dreams have been to meIn 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 brightIn the summer sky; in dreamy fields of light,And left unheedingly my very heartIn climes of mine imagining—apartFrom mine own home, with beings that have beenOf mine own thought—what more could I have seen?’Twas once &onlyonce & the wild hourFrom my rememberance shall not pass—some powerOr spell had bound me—’twas the chilly windCame o’er me in the night & left behindIts image on my spirit, or the moonShone on my slumbers in her lofty noonToo coldly—or the stars—howe’er it wasThat dream was as that night wind—let it pass.I have been happy—tho’ but in a dreamI have been happy—& I love the theme—Dreams! in their vivid colouring of life—As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strifeOf semblance with reality which bringsTo the delirious eye more lovely thingsOf Paradise & Love—& all our own!Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.{From an earlier MS. Than in the book—ED.}