The Sailor-Boy

Tis three years and a quarter since I left my own fireside To go aboard a ship through love, and plough the ocean wide. I crossed my native fields, where the scarlet poppies grew, And the groundlark left his nest like a neighbour which I knew. The pigeons from the dove cote cooed over the old lane, The crow flocks from the oakwood went flopping oer the grain; Like lots of dear old neighbours whom I shall see no more They greeted me that morning I left the English shore.…