Dream Within A Dream

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream

Take this kiss upon the brow

And in parting from you now

This much let me avow

You are not wrong, who deemed

That my days have been a dream

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, in a day, in a vision, or a memory

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 hands

Grains of golden sand

How few, yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep

While I weep, while I weep

Oh god, can I not grasp them with a tighter clasp?

Oh god, can I not save one from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?