Poems of Robert Burns Selected by Ian Rankin Read online

  Poems of

  Robert Burns

  Selected and with an Introduction by

  IAN RANKIN

  PENGUIN CLASSICS

  an imprint of

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  PENGUIN CLASSICS

  Published by the Penguin Group

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  This selection first published 2008

  1

  Selection and Introduction copyright © John Rebus Ltd, 2008

  ‘The Fornicator’, ‘Ode to Spring’ and ‘Kirkcudbright Grace’, from James Kingsley, ed.,

  The Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, 3 vols, 1968, are reproduced by permission of

  Oxford University Press

  The moral right of the editor has been asserted

  All rights reserved

  Without limiting the rights under copyright

  reserved above, no part of this publication may be

  reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system,

  or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,

  photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior

  written permission of both the copyright owner and

  the above publisher of this book

  978-0-14-190366-8

  Contents

  Introduction

  O Once I Lov’d

  Mary Morison

  It Was Upon a Lammas Night

  Song Composed in August

  John Barleycorn. A Ballad

  Poor Mailie’s Elegy

  My Father Was a Farmer

  Green Grow the Rashes. A Fragment

  Holy Willie’s Prayer

  A Poet’s Welcome to His Love-Begotten Daughter

  The Fornicator. A New Song

  On Burns’ Horse Being Impounded

  Man Was Made to Mourn. A Dirge

  The Holy Fair

  To a Mouse

  To a Louse

  The Author’s Earnest Cry and Prayer

  Scotch Drink

  Address to the Deil

  Extempore to Gavin Hamilton. Stanzas on Naething

  To a Mountain Daisy

  Epistle to a Young Friend. May – 1786

  Lines Written on a Bank-Note

  Address of Beelzebub

  A Bard’s Epitaph

  To a Haggis

  My Peggy’s Face

  O’er the Water to Charlie

  Rattlin, Roarin Willie

  On a Schoolmaster

  Tam Glen

  Auld Lang Syne

  Elegy on the Year 1788

  Afton Water

  To a Gentleman Who Had Sent Him a Newspaper

  Lassie Lie Near Me

  My Love She’s But a Lassie Yet

  Farewell to the Highlands

  John Anderson My Jo

  Tam o’ Shanter. A Tale

  The Banks o’ Doon

  Ye Jacobites By Name

  Fareweel to a’ Our Scottish Fame

  Ae Fond Kiss

  I Hae a Wife o’ My Ain

  Logan Water

  Scots Wha Hae

  A Red, Red Rose

  Sae Flaxen Were Her Ringlets

  Ode to Spring

  Is There for Honest Poverty

  Kirkcudbright Grace

  Charlie He’s My Darling

  Glossary

  Index of First Lines

  Introduction

  I grew up in the heart of the Fife coalfields. My hometown of Cardenden had barely existed (save as a church and some farms) until the discovery of local coal-seams. Early in the twentieth century families moved eastwards from Lanarkshire to Fife to claim their share of the new jobs. Houses were erected in a hurry – with no time even to think of names for the streets, so that they were called One Street, Two Street, Three Street, and so on. It was a community driven by hard work and common beliefs. The miners paid for local amenities to be constructed and even for an annual children’s outing to the seaside. Little wonder that Robert Burns – the ‘People’s Poet’, the voice of working-class Scotland – was revered.

  In primary school, with the help of the local Burns Club, the children were persuaded to learn one of the bard’s poems and one of his lyrics by heart. We were then taken to the church hall across the street and, in front of parents and dignitaries, led one at a time on to the stage to recite the one and sing the other. An elderly gentleman had been placed backstage and would take each of us by the hands, telling us not to be nervous and to fix our eyes on the large clock at the back of the hall, so as not to be distracted by the audience. Afterwards, certificates were awarded, with an additional gold-trimmed diploma for those who passed a written classroom test on Burns’s life and work.

  In a box somewhere, I probably still have all three.

  The Scots remain proud of Robert Burns. He is known internationally, celebrated around the world at Burns Night ceilidhs and dinners. On New Year’s Eve (called Hogmanay in Scotland) people link arms to sing the words of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ – whether or not they understand them. On a recent trip to Dunedin in New Zealand I was shown a large statue of the poet, dominating the main square. My guide was happy to point out that Burns had been positioned with his back to the church, but facing the pub. Yet much of Burns’s output remains unread or under-appreciated. Some people consider him a populist, others a figure of romance. Many a Scot can probably recite the first few lines of ‘To a Mouse’ or ‘To a Haggis’, or sing the opening verse of ‘A Red, Red Rose’. People know the story of ‘Tam o’ Shanter’, but only the purists have the poem by heart. So just how relevant is Burns and why does he deserve his many memorials?

  Robert Burns was a self-starter. He did not come from a privileged background, but was surrounded by the ballads, stories and songs of his native Ayrshire. As an adult, he failed (more than once) at his father’s profession of farming, but seemed to find adversity a suitable muse. He was a profligate lover and his ‘love’ poems are artful constructions, often attempting to persuade the woman that Burns will always remember her, even though he is about to move on to fresher fare. In recent years, some of Burns’s bawdier creations have been republished (see ‘The Fornicator’), showing just how earthy he was. There’s nothing fancy or high-handed about Burns, yet he is also capable of intellectual debate and political commentary. His poem ‘Fareweel to a’ Our Scottish Fame’ is a sustained piece of controlled vitriol. The battlefield heroes of the past (Bruce and Wallace) have been betrayed by a ‘coward few’, bribed to bring Scotland under the yoke of England so that it becomes a mere ‘province’. When I chose to preface my novel Black and Blue with a quote from Burns’s poem, I did so beca
use that book discussed the failed devolution vote of 1979 and the use of oil revenues as funding for the British government’s campaign in the South Atlantic. (The Scottish National Party used often to campaign under the slogan-cum-rallying-cry ‘It’s Scotland’s oil!’)

  Burns’s lifetime coincided with a period of political turmoil. He looked at the French Revolution with great interest, and was a proponent of social equality. (Having given up farming for the life of a government exciseman, his positive take on events in France almost led to his dismissal.) Influenced by Thomas Paine’s The Rights of Man, Burns’s poem ‘Is There for Honest Poverty’ (1795) contains some of his most enduring sentiments on egalitarianism. In it he champions the man of ‘independent mind’ and lampoons the baubles associated with rank and station. Burns envisages a time when people will be judged on merit alone, creating both a national and international brotherhood. It’s clear why this son of Alloway’s message travelled successfully to regions like Soviet Russia, where Burns Night is still celebrated every 25th of January. The problem with Burns Night, however, is that it is often reductive. People swig their whisky and clap their hands as a piper marches into the room, followed by a chef carrying the platter groaning with haggis. The famed poem is recited, the haggis sliced open and then everyone tucks in. Tartan is worn or displayed, and there may be dancing or song. This gives only the most slender glimpse of Burns as a man and as a poet. Read a lyric such as ‘Man Was Made to Mourn’ and you begin to sense something close to melancholy. It talks of oppression and man’s ‘inhumanity’, and pleads once more for equality and freedom. The ‘independent mind’ of ‘Is There for Honest Poverty’ here becomes ‘an independent wish’. (As I write this Introduction, there are few in Scotland who can equate the word ‘independent’ with anything other than a sundering of the political union with England.) The simmering anger in these poems seems a world away from the ‘couthy’ sentiments expressed in ‘Afton Water’ or ‘Farewell to the Highlands’. Burns, a lover of spirits and a spirited lover, was also afflicted by occasional depression and self-doubt.

  It is hard to know how to reconcile these different facets of the poet’s character, and I’m not convinced such toil needs to be undertaken. Burns, to steal Walt Whitman’s phrase, ‘contains multitudes’. He can be political, or intimately romantic. He can extol the virtues of nature, but also castigate the vagaries of human nature. Just as he charmed polite society in Edinburgh on his several visits, so he was every bit as comfortable among the regulars at the Globe Inn in Dumfries (to the point of scratching stanzas and aphorisms on its windows). We admire him for the breadth of his knowledge and artistry, for the wry humour and earthly passion exhibited in many of his poems and lyrics. We admire his humanism and belief in commonality. He showed the world that you could be a poet whatever your background and apparent station in life. He remains popular as well as populist and is a great user of the vernacular. Scots is a language ready-made for poetry, bringing with it a multitude of synonyms, images and onomatopoeic words, and ‘Tam o’ Shanter’ remains the greatest poem in the Scots language – at least until Hugh MacDiarmid. It is a celebration of community (the ‘drouthy neebors’ of the opening lines, meaning ‘thirsty friends’), but also of storytelling and linguistic verve. It takes delight in itself, which makes it a delight as a performance. It also pulls off a feat unique in poetry, in being humorous and frightening in near-equal measure.

  It can be found, of course, in this selection of the best of Robert Burns’s poems and songs.

  Ian Rankin

  O Once I Lov’d

  (TUNE: I AM A MAN UNMARRIED (NOT EXTANT))

  O once I lov’d a bonny lass

  Ay and I love her still

  And whilst that virtue warms my breast

  I’ll love my handsome Nell.

  Fal lal de dal &c.

  As bonny lasses I hae seen,

  And mony full as braw;

  But for a modest gracefu’ mien,

  The like I never saw.

  A bonny lass I will confess

  Is pleasant to the e’e;

  But without some better qualities

  She’s no a lass for me.

  But Nelly’s looks are blythe and sweet,

  And what is best of a’,

  Her reputation is compleat

  And fair without a flaw.

  She dresses ay sae clean and neat,

  Both decent and genteel;

  And then there’s something in her gate

  Gars ony dress look weel.

  A gaudy dress and gentle air

  May slightly touch the heart;

  But it’s innocence and modesty

  That polisses the dart.

  ’Tis this in Nelly pleases me;

  ’Tis this inchants my soul;

  For absolutely in my breast

  She reigns without controul.

  Finis

  Mary Morison

  (TUNE: DUNCAN DAVISON)

  O Mary, at thy window be,

  It is the wish’d, the trysted hour;

  Those smiles and glances let me see,

  That make the miser’s treasure poor:

  How blythly wad I bide the stoure,

  A weary slave frae sun to sun;

  Could I the rich reward secure,

  The lovely Mary Morison.

  Yestreen when to the trembling string

  The dance gaed thro’ the lighted ha’,

  To thee my fancy took its wing,

  I sat, but neither heard nor saw:

  Tho’ this was fair, and that was braw,

  And yon the toast of a’ the town,

  I sigh’d, and said amang them a’,

  ‘Ye are na Mary Morison.’

  O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace,

  Wha for thy sake wad gladly die!

  Or canst thou break that heart of his,

  Whase only faut is loving thee.

  If love for love thou wilt na gie,

  At least be pity to me shown;

  A thought ungentle canna be

  The thought o’ Mary Morison.

  It Was Upon a Lammas Night

  (TUNE: CORN RIGS ARE BONIE)

  It was upon a Lammas night,

  When corn rigs are bonie,

  Beneath the moon’s unclouded light,

  I held awa to Annie:

  The time flew by, wi’ tentless heed,

  Till ‘tween the late and early;

  Wi’ sma’ persuasion she agreed,

  To see me thro’ the barley.

  The sky was blue, the wind was still,

  The moon was shining clearly;

  I set her down, wi’ right good will,

  Amang the rigs o’

  barley:

  I ken’t her heart was a’ my ain;

  I lov’d her most sincerely;

  I kiss’d her owre and owre again,

  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

  I lock’d her in my fond embrace;

  Her heart was beating rarely:

  My blessings on that happy place,

  Amang the rigs o’ barley!

  But by the moon and stars so bright,

  That shone that hour so clearly!

  She ay shall bless that happy night,

  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

  I hae been blythe wi’ comrades dear;

  I hae been merry drinking;

  I hae been joyfu’ gath’rin gear;

  I hae been happy thinking;

  But a’ the pleasures e’er I saw,

  Tho’ three times doubl’d fairly,

  That happy night was worth them a’,

  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

  Corn rigs, an’ barley rigs,

  An’ corn rigs are bonie:

  I’ll ne’er forget that happy night

  Amang the rigs wi’ Annie.

  Song Composed in August

  (TUNES: I HAD A HORSE, I HAD NAE MAIR; PORT GORDON)

  Now westlin winds, and slaught’ring gunsr />
  Bring Autumn’s pleasant weather;

  And the moorcock springs, on whirring wings,

  Amang the blooming heather:

  Now waving grain, wide o’er the plain,

  Delights the weary farmer;

  And the moon shines bright, when I rove at night,

  To muse upon my charmer.

  The partridge loves the fruitful fells;

  The plover loves the mountains;

  The woodcock haunts the lonely dells;

  The soaring hern the fountains:

  Thro’ lofty groves, the cushat roves,

  The path of man to shun it;

  The hazel bush o’erhangs the thrush,

  The spreading thorn the linnet.

  Thus ev’ry kind their pleasure find,

  The savage and the tender;

  Some social join, and leagues combine;

  Some solitary wander;

  Avaunt, away! the cruel sway,

  Tyrannic man’s dominion;

  The sportsman’s joy, the murd’ring cry,

  The flutt’ring, gory pinion!

  But Peggy dear, the ev’ning’s clear,

  Thick flies the skimming swallow;

  The sky is blue, the fields in view,

  All fading-green and yellow:

  Come let us stray our gladsome way,

  And view the charms of nature;

  The rustling corn, the fruited thorn,

  And ev’ry happy creature.

  We’ll gently walk, and sweetly talk,

  Till the silent moon shine clearly;

  I’ll grasp thy waist, and fondly prest,

  Swear how I love thee dearly:

  Not vernal show’rs to budding flow’rs,

  Not autumn to the farmer,

  So dear can be, as thou to me,