Love, if I weep it will not matter,
And if you laugh I shall not care;
Foolish am I to think about it,
But it is good to feel you there.
Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,—
White and awful the moonlight reached
Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere,
There was a shutter loose,—it screeched!
Swung in the wind,—and no wind blowing!—
I was afraid, and turned to you,
Put out my hand to you for comfort,—
And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew,
Under my hand the moonlight lay!
Love, if you laugh I shall not care,
But if I weep it will not matter,—
Ah, it is good to feel you there!
This poem is one of my favorites by Edna St. Vincent Millay because there are so many ways of interperting it. i think that the speaker in this poem just broke up with their lover and is realizing just how much she misses them when she awakes from a nightmare scared with no one to comfort her. I also think she is trying to convince herself that she no longer has feelings for her ex-lover but deep down inside she knows she does.
The dream is a wonderful poem, expressing how real dreams are, and how, when you wake from one, all you really want is to be held by the one you love.