Classic Poem

Dreams that delude with flying shade men's minds
No airy phantoms are, nor sent by gods
From any shrine of theirs, but each man only
Weaves for himself his dream. And when in sleep,
Conquered, his limbs repose, and quiet comes,
Then the imponderable mind pursues
In darkness the slow circuit of the day.—
If towns have shook before him and sad cities
Under the weight of flames have been down-razed,
Javelins and fleeing armies he beholds,
The funerals of kings and plains wide-watered
With rivers of shed blood. If he's an orator,
Statutes and courts appear before his eyes;
He looks with terror on tribunals thronged
With multitudes. The miser hides his riches
And digs up buried treasure, and the huntsman
Drives through the shaken woods his yelling dogs.
The sailor dreams of shipwreck, from the waves,
Gasping, he takes his vessel, or in death
Seizes on it and sinks. And the adultress
Dreams, and so yields herself. The woman writes
In dreams unto her lover: why, the dog,
Sleeping, believes he follows on the hare!—
So all night long endured, the wounds of day
Doubly are sorrow to the miserable.