GIVE ME MY DREAMS.
By A. J. Waterhouse.
Give me my dreams. All else is naught,
At price of pain success is bought;
We struggle upward but to fall;
The prize we grasp but holds us thrall;
The lips that cheer us through the years
Some day smile not for all our tears;
We build awhile, we know not what,
And the toiler is forgot.
Give me my dreams.
Give me my dreams. A child am I
Who stands In darkness but to sigh,
Until a hand doth backward roll
The gray, damp mists about my soul,
And then—oh, dream of dreams that cheers—
They come, the loved of other years,
And voices whisper soft and low
The loving words of long ago.
Give me my dreams.
Give me my dreams. Oh, little maid,
With whom of old I laughed and played.
They say the ivy loves to creep
Above the grave where now you sleep;
They say the robin’s song no more
Can wake you as it did of yore.
What matter? Still In dreams you creep
Unto my side a tryst to keep.
Give me my dreams.
Give me my dreams. All else is dross.
But still I count it little loss,
For yet in dreams the bright stars burn
As in the years to which I turn;
White hands reach to me through the mist,
By lips I loved my lips are kissed;
And all life’s fields are love aglow.
As they were once, oh, long ago—
Give me my dreams.
Los Angeles Herald.