Imitation
Edgar Allan Poe * Track #6 On Tamerlane and Other Poems
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Album Tamerlane and Other Poems
Imitation by Edgar Allan Poe
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Edgar Allan PoeAbout
First published in 1827, this twenty-line poem may seem somewhat familiar; it is actually a first draft of Edgar Allen Poe’s famous Dream Within a Dream. As a result, the overarching theme in both poems is that hope is an illusion. Poe’s source of inspiration for this poem is from Lord Byron’s The D...
Imitation Annotated
A dark unfathom'd tide
Of interminable pride—
A mystery, and a dream,
Should my early life seem;
I say that dream was fraught
With a wild and waking thought
Of beings that have been,
Which my spirit hath not seen.
Had I let them pass me by,
With a dreaming eye!
Let none of earth inherit
That vision of my spirit;
Those thoughts I would control,
As a spell upon his soul:
For that bright hope at last
And that light time have past,
And my worldly rest hath gone
With a sigh as it pass'd on:
I care not though it perish
With a thought I then did cherish.