All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

- Excerpt from A Dream Within A Dream by Edgar Allan Poe

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This Poe tattoo was submitted by Andrew and comes with an interesting story:

Five years ago I stumbled on this Edgar Allan Poe book printed in 1922. I had no clue how it ended up on my shelf and had never seen it before – which was pretty amazing considering I only owned about 20 books and most of them were crap. According to a signature inside, it belonged to my Grandpa who had died in the ’80s and some how ended up in my hands.

The quote tattooed on my arm comes from Tamerlane, one of Poe’s earliest poems. The passage is probably my favorite from all his works.

I wouldn’t say the poem drastically impacted me, but around the same I made a major shift in how I lived my life and feel Poe’s work had some influence.

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This was my favorite poem growing up. After playing with tattoo ideas for a while when this one hit me, so I went with it, and it became my first tattoo.

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
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!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

- Edgar Allan Poe, A Dream Within A Dream

PS
Yesterday would have been Poe’s 300th 200th birthday!  I can count.

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Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
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!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

- Edgar Allan Poe, A Dream Within A Dream

(source)

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