ON SEEING ONE ON A LADY’S BONNET AT CHURCH |
1. |
Ha! whare ye gaun, ye crowlin ferlie ? |
Your impudence protects you sairly, |
I canna say but ye strunt rarely |
Owre gauze and lace, |
Tho’ faith! I fear ye dine but sparely |
On sic a place.
|
2. |
Ye ugly, creepin, blastit wonner, |
Detested. shunn’d by saunt an’ sinner, |
How daur ye set your fit upon her— |
Sae fine a lady! |
Gae somewhere else and seek your dinner |
On some poor body.
|
3. |
Swith! in some beggar’s hauffet squattle : |
There ye may creep, and sprawl, and
sprattle, |
Wi’ ither kindred,jumping cattle, |
In shoals and nations ; |
Whare horn nor bane ne’er daur unsettle |
Your thick plantations.
|
4. |
Now haud you there! ye’re out o’sight, |
Below the fatt’rills, snug an’ tight ; |
Na, faith ye yet! ye’ll no be right, |
Till ye’ve got on it— |
The vera tapmost, tow’ring height |
O’ Miss’s bonnet.
|
5. |
My sooth! right bauld ye set your nose out, |
As plump an’ grey as onie grozet : |
O for some rank, mercurial rozet, |
Or fell, red smeddum, |
I’d gie ye sic a hearty dose o’t, |
Wad dress your droddum!
|
6. |
I wad na been surpris’d to spy |
You on an auld wife’s flainen toy ; |
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy, |
On’s wyliecoat ; |
But Miss’s fine Lunardi! fye! |
How daur ye do’t?
|
7. |
O Jenny, dinna toss your head, |
An’ set your beauties a’ abread! |
Ye little ken what cursèd speed |
The blastie’s makin! |
Thae winks an’ finger-ends, I dread, |
Are notice takin!
|
8. |
O wad some Power the giftie gie us |
To see oursels as ithers see us! |
It wad frae monie a blunder free us, |
An’ foolish notion : |
What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us, |
An’ ev’n devotion!
|
Robert Burns
| Classic Poems |
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[ A Red, Red Rose ] [ To a Mountain Daisy ] [ Address to a Haggis ] [ Address to Edinburgh ] [ Auld Lang Syne ] [ Is there for Honest Poverty ] [ Address to the Unco Guid ] [ The Cotter's Saturday Night ] [ To a Louse ] [ My Heart's in the Highlands ] [ Holy Willie's Prayer ] [ Tam O'Shanter ] [ To a Mouse ] |