Vistas Poem by Odell Shepard

As I walked through the dream-peopled streets
Of the wind-rustling, elm-shaded city
Where all of the houses were friends
And the trees were all lovers of her,
The spell of its old enchantment
Was woven again to subdue me
With magic of flickering shadows,
Blown branches and leafy stir.

Street after street, as I passed,
Lured me and beckoned me onward,
Releasing like flowery fragrance
Remembrance and hope on the air.
At the end of each breeze-blurred vista
She seemed to be watching and waiting,
With leaf shadows over her gown
And sunshine gliding her hair.

For there was a dream that the kind God
Withheld, while granting us many.-
But surely, I think, we shall come
Sometime, at the last, she and I,
To the heaven He keeps for all tired souls,
The quiet suburban gardens
Where He Himself walks in the evening
Beneath the rose-dropping sky,
And watches the balancing elm-trees
With a sob of delight for their beauty,
And hears through their lofty arches
The night breeze ruffle by.