When I Go Home

When I go home, green, green will glow the grass,

Whereon the flight of sun and cloud will pass;

Long lines of wood-ducks through the deepening gloam

Will hold above the west, as wrought on brass,

And fragrant furrows will have delved the loam,

When I go home.

When I go home, the dogwood stars will dash

The solemn woods above the bearded ash,

The yellow-jasmine, whence its vine hath clomb,

Will blaze the valleys with its golden flash,

And every orchard flaunt its polychrome,

When I go home.

When I go home and stroll about the farm,

The thicket and the barnyard will be warm.

Jess will be there, and Nigger Bill, and Tom —

On whom time's chisel works no hint of harm —

And, oh,‘ twill be a day to rest and roam,

When I go home!