I Did Not Return

In the quiet of a Spring evening in a field by the River Finnow
In fancy i can hear the soft lowing of a cow
When the nesting birds sing in the greenness of May
In the place where i was raised in from here far away

The birds are on song as the sun is going down
In that beautiful countryside by Millstreet Town
Where i grew to love Nature when i was a boy
And learning of her ways today i enjoy

When i left old Clara wore a hat of snow
And Finnow in the old fields bank high did flow
And the migratory redwings were chirping on the bare deciduous trees
On weather temperatures just below zero degrees

I hoped to be back like the swallows in Spring
When the birds in the leafy groves of Millstreet do sing
But i did not make it back to see the hawthorns in their blooms white as snow
In the rushy fields when the male pheasant crow

No i did not return when the fields wear their flowers
And are looking lush and green after the mild Spring showers
And the cattle on nutritious young grass gaining weight by the day
But one ought to live in the now as the wise one does say.