Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer, editor and literary critic. He was the central figure of Romanticism in the United States and one of the country’s earliest practitioners of the short story ... [+]
In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed–
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.
Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?
That holy dream–that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.
What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar–
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?