Of scorn of angry sunsets, and of Carnac grim and bare;
Oh, won’t I have the leaping veins, and tawny cheek and sparkling eye,
When I come back to Montparnasse and dream of Finistère.
Behold me with staff and scrip, footing it merrily in the Land of Pardons. I have no goal. When I am weary I stop at some auberge; when I am rested I go on again. Neither do I put any constraint on my spirit. No subduing of the mind to the task of the moment. I dream to heart’s content.
My dreams stretch into the future. I see myself a singer of simple songs, a laureate of the under-dog. I will write books, a score of them. I will voyage far and wide. I will…
But there! Dreams are dangerous. They waste the time one should spend in making them come true. Yet when we do make them come true, we find the vision sweeter than the reality. How much of our happiness do we owe to dreams? I have in mind one old chap who used to herd the sheep on my uncle’s farm.
OLD DAVID SMAIL
He dreamed away his hours in school;
He sat with such an absent air,
The master reckoned him a fool,
And gave him up in dull despair.
