Poem: Hold Fast Your Dreams

Hold Fast Your Dreams

Hold fast your dreams!
Within your heart
Keep one, still, secret spot
Where dreams may go,
And sheltered so,
May thrive and grow-
Where doubt and fear are not.
O, keep a place apart,
Within your heart,
For little dreams to go!

Think still of lovely things that are not true,
Let wish and magic work at will in you.
Be sometimes blind to sorrow. Make believe!
Forget the calm that lies
In disillusioned eyes.
Though we all know that we must die,
Yet you and I
May walk like gods and be
Even now at home in immortality!

We see so many ugly things-
Deceits and wrongs and quarrelings;
We know, alas! we know
How quickly fade
The color in the west,
The bloom upon the flower,
The bloom upon the breast
And youth's blind hour.
Yet, keep within your heart
A place apart
Where little dreams may go,
May thrive and grow.
Hold fast- hold fast your dreams!
                                      -Louise Driscoll

This is a beautiful poem by Louise Driscoll. I enjoy reading it over and over again. The book "A Child's Anthology of Poetry" is one of my best purchases to date. Every time I read a poem from this book, whether it be the first time or 5th, I reflect on it differently. Poems are supposed to have an emotional effect on you. They surely do. Many of the poems in the book are for children, but as you read this poem, I think you'd agree that it's aimed for adults as well. Much like the other poems, adults will interpret them differently and find deeper meaning within each one. I hope this poem finds your heart as it did mine.