If I could sleep and dream that love were true,
Had e'er been true, unsullied and supreme,
I'd gladly forfeit all the bliss I knew
And all I ever could know. Blessed dream,
Lay on my weary eyes eternal sleep,
For now they never open but to weep —

If I could count from off their bitter span
The days of disillusion I have known,
The cruel knowledge that the heart of man
Has never climbed the heights, has never grown
Through passion purified to peaks sublime,
Would I not barter all that's left of Time?