Dream Within A Dream

this much let me avow you are not wrong who deemed that my days have been a dream yet if hope has flown away in a night, in a day, in a vision, or a memory 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 the surf tormented shore and I hold within my hands grains of golden sand how few yet how they creep through my fingers to the deep while I weep, while I weep oh god can I not grasp them with a tighter clasp oh god can I not save one from the pitiless wave is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream