For Annie — manuscript version
Edgar Allan Poe
Manuscript version, reproduced in The Bookman (London), January 1909, vol. 35, no. 208, p. 190.

All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the 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 I see or seem
But a dream within a dream?