A Dream Within a Dream

Take this kiss upon the brow!

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow--

You're not Wrong, who deem

That my days have been a dream;

Yet if Hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

Ins 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 save

One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within dream?