 | Irish Poems |  |
57
COMPENSATION
To Mr. Justice Ross
'Twas worth the years of exile just to recapture
The old delight, the wild bliss of coming back.
I can praise God that I have tasted the rapture
Before the night darkened upon my track.
The old delight, the wild bliss of coming back.
I can praise God that I have tasted the rapture
Before the night darkened upon my track.
Nigh on twenty years in a foreign city,
And the best hour that hour in fog and rain,
Going home, and my heart singing its ditty
In time to the creaking screw and the throbbing train.
And the best hour that hour in fog and rain,
Going home, and my heart singing its ditty
In time to the creaking screw and the throbbing train.
Oh, the yellow streets and the poor sad people
Trudging to their task in a pallid gloom
Below the black house-walls, under spire and steeple,
And I for the sun at last and going home!
Trudging to their task in a pallid gloom
Below the black house-walls, under spire and steeple,
And I for the sun at last and going home!
Sorry I was for them that weren't going,
As though I travelled to lands where no man grieves.
My love she is, my heart's delight, and her West Wind blowing,
And I coming home to her, carrying my sheaves!
As though I travelled to lands where no man grieves.
My love she is, my heart's delight, and her West Wind blowing,
And I coming home to her, carrying my sheaves!
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