Edgar Allan Poe- explanation to his poems

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In this poem, one is struck with a sense of instability throughout. Poe is writing of how quickly things pass, and how hard it is to hold on to them. In one line he says "Can I not grasp them with a tighter clasp?" Here he implies how he cannot hold onto anything good or bad, because it slips away no matter what. It is not written with sadness, but more of a frustration, not quite a lament. He says "my days have been a dream," meaning everything passes with little or no reality. This poem is rather short, with a simple rhyme and meter of AABBCCDD...etc. The language is a bit flowery, but appropriate for the time and it still brings across the intended message of nothing with substance.

The tone or author's attitude in this poem is despair, and he conveys despair not only with the meaning of his words but with the means of expression. The poem is spattered inconsistently with lines of trochaic tetrameter/trimeter, and the inconsistency in meter seems to suggests that the essence of his life is eroding into chaos. The poet experiences and/or empathizes with torment, weeping, and cruelty. Some of the