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?
The Hyperboles are in ORANGE
The Personification are in BLUE
The Metaphor are in GREEN
The Simile are in PURPLE
The Symbolism are in LIGHT BLUE
Before I start talking about why I like this poem, let me first say that there are actual various interpretations of what the poet is trying to say here.
One of the interpretations is that the poem is about Poe's feelings about his life at the time, dramatizing his confusion in watching the few precious things in his life slip away. Realizing he cannot hold onto even one grain of sand leads to his final question that all things are a dream.
Why I like this Poem
There are two main reason why I really like this poem. The first reason is the why the poet writes this poem and the second is the content of this poem.
The thing about the way the poet writes which interests me the most is the repetition of the same structure. By just changing a few words in the repetition, the meaning can change a 180 degrees.
As for the content, I think it is really great to represent time with sand. The thing about sand is that it is too small for you to hold and you are unable to stop the flow, just like time. Therefore, it is trying to say that the control of time cannot be done as it will just keep on flowing.
3 comments:
Another thing to remember about the "time is sand" metaphor is that this was also literal in Poe's time; people had clocks and pocketwatches, but they also still used hourglasses, which literally used sand to show the passage of time.
Thanks. I overlooked the fact that this was written a long time ago.
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