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!