The Vagabonds

What saw you in your flight to-day,     Crows, awinging your homeward way?     Went you far in carrion quest,     Crows, that worry the sunless west?     Thieves and villains, you shameless things!     Black your record as black your wings.     Tell me, birds of the inky hue,     Plunderous rogues - to-day have you     Seen with mischievous, prying eyes     Lands where earlier suns arise?     Saw you a lazy beck between     Trees that shadow its breast in green,     Teased by obstinate stones that lie     Crossing the current tauntingly?     Fields abloom on the farther side     With purpling clover lying wide -     Saw you there as you circled by,     Vale-environed a cottage lie,     Girt about with emerald bands,     Nestling down in its meadow lands?     Saw you this on your thieving raids?     Speak - you rascally renegades!     Thieved you also away from me     Olden scenes that I long to see?     If, O! crows, you have flown since morn     Over the place where I was born,     Forget will I, how black you were     Since dawn, in feather and character;     Absolve will I, your vagrant band     Ere you enter your slumberland.