Father, You Did Not Stay

When you went westward to have some fodder
From the salty green of the gram-crop ,
To the thorny brown of the ears of wheat;
I followed you , I ran after you
With the tumbling little feet .

You rubbed the raw tobacco with lime
And talked to the farmers gay ,
When I with a friend , in seek and hide
Abandoned myself in play .

The fields are there, the crops as ever ,
The dusks of a winter's day;
The setting sun, the smoke and the murk
O, Father, you did not stay .