Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream! My spirit not awak'ning till the beam Of an Eternity should bring the morrow: Yes! tho' that long dream were of hopeless sorrow, 'Twere better than the dull reality Of 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 eternally Continuing - as dreams have been to me In 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 bright In the summer sky; in dreamy fields of light, And left unheedingly my very heart In climes of mine imagining - apart From mine own home, with beings that have been Of mine own thought - what more could I have seen?
'Twas once and only once and the wild hour From my remembrance shall not pass - some power Or spell had bound me - 'twas the chilly wind Came o'er me in the night and left behind Its image on my spirit, or the moon Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon Too coldly - or the stars - howe'er it was That dream was as that night wind - let it pass.
I have been happy - tho' but in a dream. I have been happy - and I love the theme - Dreams! in their vivid colouring of life - As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife Of semblance with reality which brings To the delirious eye more lovely things Of Paradise and Love - and all our own! Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.