O Jenny, dinna toss your head, An' set your beauties a' abread! [abroad] Ye little ken what cursed speed The blastie's makin'! [little wretch] Thae winks and finger-ends, I dread, [Those] Are notice takin'!
O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae mony a blunder free us, And foolish notion: What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us, And ev'n devotion!
ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH A PLOUGH IN APRIL, 1786
Wee modest crimson-tippèd flow'r, Thou's met me in an evil hour; For I maun crush amang the stoure [must] Thy slender stem: To spare thee now is past my pow'r, Thou bonnie gem.
Alas! it's no thy neibor sweet, The bonnie lark, companion meet, Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet Wi' spreckl'd breast, When upward springing, blythe to greet The purpling east.
Cauld blew the bitter-biting north Upon thy early humble birth; Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth Amid the storm, Scarce rear'd above the parent-earth Thy tender form.
The flaunting flow'rs our gardens yield High shelt'ring woods and wa's maun shield, [walls] But thou, beneath the random bield [shelter] O' clod or stane, Adorns the histie stibble-field, [barren] Unseen, alane.
There, in thy scanty mantle clad, Thy snawy bosom sun-ward spread, Thou lifts thy unassuming head In humble guise; But now the share uptears thy bed, And low thou lies!
Such is the fate of artless maid, Sweet flow'ret of the rural shade, By love's simplicity betray'd, And guileless trust, Till she like thee, all soil'd, is laid Low i' the dust.
Such is the fate of simple bard, On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd: Unskilful he to note the card Of prudent lore, Till billows rage, and gales blow hard, And whelm him o'er!
Such fate to suffering worth is giv'n, Who long with wants and woes has striv'n, By human pride or cunning driv'n To mis'ry's brink, Till wrench'd of ev'ry stay but Heav'n, He, ruin'd, sink!
Ev'n thou who mourn'st the Daisy's fate, That fate is thine--no distant date; Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives elate Full on thy bloom, Till crush'd beneath the furrow's weight Shall be thy doom!
THE AULD FARMER'S NEW-YEAR MORNING SALUTATION TO HIS AULD MARE, MAGGIE.
ON GIVING HER THE ACCUSTOMED RIPP OF CORN TO HANSEL IN THE NEW YEAR [welcome with a present]