C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Thomas Lovell Beddoes (1803–1849)
Dream-Peddlery
I
What would you buy?
Some cost a passing-bell;
Some a light sigh,
That shakes from Life’s fresh crown
Only a rose-leaf down.
If there were dreams to sell,
Merry and sad to tell,
And the crier rung the bell,
What would you buy?—
With bowers nigh,
Shadowy, my woes to still,
Until I die.
Such pearl from Life’s fresh crown
Fain would I shake me down.
Were dreams to have at will,
This would best heal my ill,
This would I buy.—
Ill didst thou buy:
Life is a dream, they tell,
Waking to die.—
Dreaming a dream to prize
Is wishing ghosts to rise;
And if I had the spell
To call the buried well,
Which one would I?—
What shall I call
Out of hell’s murky haze,
Heaven’s blue pall?—
Raise my loved long-lost boy
To lead me to his joy.—
There are no ghosts to raise;
Out of death lead no ways:
Vain is the call.—
No love thou hast.—
Else lie, as I will do,
And breathe thy last,
So out of Life’s fresh crown
Fall like a rose-leaf down.
Thus are the ghosts to woo;
Thus are all dreams made true,
Ever to last!