I dreamt last night

that some friends and I met

in a café in Chicago.

There we chatted, laughed, and told stories

until unbeknownst to me the time came

for my friends to take up and leave.

“Where are you going?” I asked them,

“You’ll see, just wait there,” they replied smiling.

I sat on the plump red sofa in that café

for a few minutes more, when from the crowd

came my two friends once more.

They returned with three tickets,

and joined me at the seat,

whose arms protruded from its back

and buckled us in all quite neat.

Then out of the café did we fly

Without even the bat of an eye

for that flight was without motion

as we disolv’d without commotion

and soon I awoke as if from a slumber

conduced by jet lag, on an expressway

riding in a small bus, further from the city where I belong’d.

Then suddenly we came to our exit, and rounded a bend

going down a road lined with hedges

that seem’d to go on for no end.

Then at their conclusion, we did find,

what appear’d to be a train station

situated atop a hill, the tracks cover’d by fog

“Welcome to Glenview,” said the driver,

yet this was not the Glenview that I knew.

Heaven forbid it! I looked at my watch

and recall’d my calendar

that in the city I had to be

in less than an hour.

In a sort of panic I awoke,

to find myself confounded

haunt’d by what was but a dream.