grasping at dreams

one Porlock merchant rapping on the door
destroyed the fabled walls of Xanadu
mere shards of what the poet know was more
when dream's retold on paper, still gleam through
the metaphor of language dimly hints
inchoate wonders that were clear in dreams
Escheric forms in Maxfield Parrish tints
and eyes with super-lapidary gleams
who knows what words evoke in other minds
your qualia are just hearsay to me
I seize the closest referent I find
as if I knew your inner glossary
if Coleridge's verse still resonate
there's no objective test that deems it great