George William Curtis (1824–1892)

I WALKED beside the evening sea,

And dreamed a dream that could not be;

The waves that plunged along the shore

Said only—“Dreamer, dream no more.”

But still the legions charged the beach;

Loud rang their battle-cry, like speech;

But changed was the imperial strain:

It murmured—“Dreamer, dream again!”

I homeward turned from out the gloom,—

That sound I heard not in my room;

But suddenly a sound, that stirred

Within my very breast, I heard.

It was my heart, that like a sea

Within my breast beat ceaselessly;

But like the waves along the shore,

It said—“Dream on!” and “Dream no more!”