A Dream Within A Dream, by Edgar Allan Poe →

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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?

Analysis of Poem

By “a dream within a dream”, Poe describes that neither one of those dreams is more real than the other. He adds and implies that in life all we see, or seem to see, is nothing more than a dream within a dream.

The overall message is the poet’s doubt and uncertainty about the nature of reality. He questions whether life itself is just an illusion, trying to understand his own life’s path.

This picture should be labeled fantasy and seems to be a dream within a dream.

Alone, by Edgar Allan Poe →

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From childhood’s hour, I have not been 
As others were—I have not seen 
As others saw—I could not bring 
My passions from a common spring— 
From the same source I have not taken 
My sorrow—I could not awaken 
My heart to joy at the same tone— 
And all I lov’d—I lov’d alone— 
Then—in my childhood—in the dawn 
Of a most stormy life—was drawn 
From ev’ry depth of good and ill 
The mystery which binds me still— 
From the torrent, or the fountain— 
From the red cliff of the mountain— 
From the sun that ’round me roll’d 
In its autumn tint of gold— 
From the lightning in the sky 
As it pass’d me flying by— 
From the thunder, and the storm— 
And the cloud that took the form 
(When the rest of Heaven was blue) 
Of a demon in my view—

Thoughts about Poem

Poe, wrote this poem as an adult, looking back at his life. He had felt alone since his youth and still did. As he looked back from “ev’ry depth of good and ill” it was still a mystery.

For example look at theselines from the Raven (reviewed in this section).

“Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.”

Most of Poe’s memories are not happy and suggest loneliness.