Edgar Allan Poe (19 January 1809 - 7 October 1849 / Boston)

Like sands in the hour glass!
What a poem and what profound feeling!
Like high school kids sitting stunned after an overload of sucrose!

Poe lost his child bride in 1847, and subsequently died himself of exhaustion
brought on by bouts of heavy drinking in October 1849, at the age of forty.

Poe influenced the French poet Charles Baudelaire, and others including
Mallarme, Valery, and Rimbaud, as well as the symbolist school in France.
Poe has been recognized as not only a poet, but as a critic and short story
writer.

Let some of his over-wrought admirers (agony of losing again and again?)
on this site read his literary output in genres other than poetry. Poe was
more than the adolescent in love with himself that they applaud!

It's not so much the agony over losing his wife... it's the agony of losing here again and again...


The meaning is best explained by Poe himself in his letter to George Eveleth in January 1848...


'Six years ago a wife, whom I loved as no man ever loved before, ruptured a blood vessel in singing. Her life was despaired of. I took leave of her forever and underwent all the agonies of her death. She recovered partially and I again hoped. At the end of a year the vessel broke again. I went through precisely the same scene....Then again-again-and even once again, at varying intervals. Each time I felt all the agonies of her death-and at each accession of her disorder I loved her more dearly and clung to her life with more desperate pertinacity. But I am constitutionally sensitive-nervous in a very unusual degree. I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity. During these fits of absolute unconsciousness, I drank-God only knows how often or how much. As a matter of course, my enemies referred the insanity to the drink, rather than the drink to the insanity.... It was the horrible never-ending oscillation between hope and despair, which I could _not_ longer have endured without total loss of reason. In the death of what was my life, then, I received a new, but-O God! -how melancholy an existence! '

Actually, she didn't 'burst a blood vessel' technically, she had TB. I should point out that she fought the disease for five years before she died. That's a long time for poor Poe to ride such an emotional rollercoaster!

'Like sands in the hourglass, so are the days of our lives! ' I just read this poem for the first time today, and I was completely awestruck by it. I wish I knew the history of this poem, but I suppose if we knew too much about Poe, we would not be so mesmerized with his literature. The mystery surrounding his life is what attracts many people to his writings, which are considerable. My interpretation of this poem is that it is personifying his wife, Virginia Clemm, her death, and his agony over losing her. He couldn't hang onto the sand in his hand or save her from the pitiless wave (her death to tuberculosis, which wasn't pretty!) , no matter how hard he tried. As far as a dream within a dream, for those of us who have gone through the loss of loved ones and the heart-wrenching grief that occurs, that is what it feels like. It can cause you to lose a grip on reality to a certain extent.

On another note, Edgar Allan Poe is regarded as the greatest writer of all time in France and Japan, yet here in his own country he is not as highly regarded. They even have a special affectionate name for him in Japan. Researching Poe's life is almost as fascinating as reading his works.

I came across this poem in the movie 'Picnic at Hanging Rock'by Peter Weir. The movie is very atmospheric and contemplative and has a wonderful musical score. The movie starts off by the 'dream within a dream line' voiced by a young woman in Victorian times in Australia.

The poem, for me, has spiritual undertones. It is a journey towards the realization of life being ephemeral and fleeting. But this angst should eventually lead the poet to the realization of something that changes not, in the midst of all these changes. And then he would realize that all that he sees and seems was but a dream.

A nice reflection, very philosophical in approach as the words seem to gently express the dreams within.

I love the poem, its almost like my poem I wrote a few days ago

Excellent poem. In 1985, the musicians of Propaganda chose this magnificent poem.

he suffered in secret orchids, and was probally made into a batch of rotgut whiskey!

THIS IS MY FAVORITE POEM happy to see iit in the top 20 at least

I really like this poem it reminds me of life no matter how tight you try to hold on to it, it will eventually one day end and your body back to the dust.