Читать книгу The Canongate Burns - Robert Burns - Страница 21

Duan First1

First printed in the Kilmarnock edition, 1786.

The Sun had clos’d the winter-day,

The Curlers quat their roaring play, quit

And hunger’d Maukin taen her way, hare, taken

To kail-yards green, kitchen-gardens

5 While faithless snaws ilk step betray snows each

Whare she has been. where

The Thresher’s weary flingin-tree, flailing

The lee-lang day had tired me; live-long

And when the Day had clos’d his e’e eye

10 Far i’ the West,

Ben i’ the Spence, right pensivelie, back, parlour

I gaed to rest. went

There, lanely by the ingle-cheek, lonely, fire side

I sat and ey’d the spewing reek, smoke

15 That fill’d, wi’ hoast-provoking smeek, cough, smoke

The auld clay biggin; old, building

An’ heard the restless rattons squeak rats

About the riggin. roof

All in this mottie, misty clime, dusty specks

20 I backward mus’d on wasted time:

How I had spent my youthfu’ prime,

An’ done naething, nothing

But stringing blethers up in rhyme, nonesense stories

For fools to sing.

25 Had I to guid advice but harket, good, listened

I might, by this, hae led a market, have

Or strutted in a bank and clarket clarked

My Cash-Account:

While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarket, half-clothed

30 Is a’ th’ amount.

I started, mutt’ring blockhead! coof! fool

An’ heav’d on high my wauket loof, horny palm/hand

To swear by a’ yon starry roof,

Or some rash aith, oath

35 That I, henceforth, would be rhyme-proof

Till my last breath —

When click! the string the snick did draw; door latch

And jee! the door gaed to the wa’; went, wall

And by my ingle-lowe I saw, fire-flame

40 Now bleezan bright,

A tight, outlandish Hizzie, braw, girl

Come full in sight.

Ye need na doubt, I held my whisht; not doubt, said nothing

The infant aith, half-form’d, was crusht; oath/pledge

45 I glowr’d as eerie’s I’d been dusht, stared, touched

In some wild glen;

When sweet, like modest Worth, she blusht,

And stepped ben. inside

Green, slender, leaf-clad Holly-boughs leaf-clothed/covered

50 Were twisted, gracefu’, round her brows;

I took her for some SCOTTISH MUSE,

By that same token;

And come to stop those reckless vows,

Would soon been broken.

55 A ‘hair-brain’d, sentimental trace’

Was strongly marked in her face;

A wildly-witty, rustic grace

Shone full upon her;

Her eye, ev’n turn’d on empty space,

60 Beam’d keen with Honor.

Down flow’d her robe, a tartan sheen, bright

Till half a leg was scrimply seen; barely

And such a leg! my bonie JEAN

Could only peer it; equal

65 Sae straught, sae taper, tight an’ clean so, straight, so

Nane else came near it. no-one

Her Mantle large, of greenish hue,

My gazing wonder chiefly drew;

Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw

70 A lustre grand;

And seem’d, to my astonish’d view,

A well-known Land.

Here, rivers in the sea were lost;

There, mountains to the skies were tosst;

75 Here, tumbling billows mark’d the coast,

With surging foam;

There, distant shone Art’s lofty boast,

The lordly dome.

Here, DOON pour’d down his far-fetch’d floods;

80 There, well-fed IRWINE stately thuds: beats/churns

Auld hermit AIRE staw thro’ his woods, Ayr, stole/steals

On to the shore;

And many a lesser torrent scuds races along

With seeming roar.

85 Low, in a sandy valley spread,

An ancient BOROUGH rear’d her head;

Still, as in Scottish Story read,

She boasts a Race

To ev’ry nobler virtue bred,

90 And polish’d grace.

[By stately tow’r, or palace fair,

Or ruins pendent in the air,

Bold stems of Heroes, here and there,

I could discern;

95 Some seem’d to muse, some seem’d to dare,

With feature stern.

My heart did glowing transport feel,

To see a Race2 heroic wheel,

And brandish round the deep-dy’d steel

100 In sturdy blows;

While, back-recoiling, seem’d to reel

Their Suthron foes. English

His COUNTRY’S SAVIOUR,3 mark him well!

Bold RICHARDTON’S4 heroic swell;

105 The Chief on Sark5 who glorious fell

In high command;

And He whom ruthless Fates expel

His native land.

There, where a sceptr’d Pictish6 shade

110 Stalk’d round his ashes lowly laid,

I mark’d a martial Race, pourtray’d

In colours strong:

Bold, soldier-featur’d, undismay’d,

They strode along.

115 Thro’ many a wild, romantic grove,7

Near many a hermit-fancy’d cove

(Fit haunts for Friendship or for Love

In musing mood),

An aged Judge, I saw him rove,

120 Dispensing good.

With deep-struck, reverential awe,8

The learned Sire and Son I saw:

To Nature’s God, and Nature’s law,

They gave their lore;

125 This, all its source and end to draw,

That, to adore.

BRYDON’S brave Ward I well could spy,9

Beneath old SCOTIA’S smiling eye;

Who call’d on Fame, low standing by,

130 To hand him on,

Where many a Patriot-name on high,

And Hero shone].

The final seven stanzas, enclosed above in square brackets, were added in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.