Ambrose Bierce

Black Beetles in Amber Ambrose Bierce

I dreamed I was dreaming one morn as I lay In a garden with flowers teeming. On an island I lay in a mystical bay, In the dream that I dreamed I was dreaming. The ghost of a scent-had it followed me there From the place where I truly was resting? It filled like an anthem the aisles of the air, The presence of roses attesting. Yet I thought in the dream that I dreamed I dreamed That the place was all barren of roses- That it only seemed; and the place, I deemed, Was the Isle of Bewildered Noses. Full many a seaman had testified How all who sailed near were enchanted, And landed to search (and in searching died) For the roses the Sirens had planted.