Dreaming Reality Poem by Richard Stamper

In the real world, as in dreams,
Nothing is quite as it seems.
To see what we have never seen,
To be what we have never been,
To shed the chrysalis, learn to fly,
Depart the earth, kiss the sky,
To be reborn, be someone new,
Is this a dream or is it true?

Is my life in fact a dream?
Are things not always as they seem?
Are daylight hours reality,
Or do I dream eternally?
In the dream world or the real,
We cannot know what we can't feel.
What is not a dream by day,
Comes to us at night to stay.

Dreams - vivid colors of life,
Or fleeting, obscure, murky strife?
Façade of reality brings,
To the mind, exquisite things:
Love, regret, memories, cheer,
Imagination, even fear.
The lives we live appear, it seems,
To be a dream within a dream.
A long dream of hopeless sorrow,
I'll dream my life again tomorrow.

(27 February 2005)