DREAMS.
Revere the mind, so full of mystery,
Even in its passive hours.
Behold it roam,
With unseal'd eye and wide unfolded wing,
While the tir'd body sleeps. Immortal guest!
Our earthly nature bows itself to thee,
Pressing its ear of flesh unto the sigh
Of thy perturbed visions, if perchance
It hear some murmur of thy birth divine,
Thy deathless heritage.
Ah! dreams are dear
To those whom waking life hath surfeited
With dull monotony. When the long day
Wends to its close, and stealthy evening steals,
Like some lean miser, greedily to snatch
Hope's wreath, that morning gave, is it not sweet
To close our eyelids, and to find the rose
That hides no thorn, the gold that knows no rust,
Spreading where'er we tread?—Is it not sweet
To 'scape from stern reality, and glide
Where'er wild fancy marks her fairy way
