A brief return today to Burns, the nation’s ultimate chronicler of love.
This poem ranks among his sunniest on the subject, and the closing transcendental lines are particularly fine; but it is less popular as poem or song than others such as A Red Red Rose.
O WERE I ON PARNASSUS HILL
O were I on Parnassus hill;
Or had o’ Helicon my fill;
That I might catch poetic skill,
To sing how dear I love thee.
But Nith maun be my Muse’s well,
My Muse maun be thy bonie sell;
On Corsincon I’ll glowr and spell,
And write how dear I love thee.
~
Them come, sweet Muse, inspire my lay!
For a’ the lee-lang simmer’s day,
I coudna sing, I coudna say,
How much, how dear, I love thee.
I see thee dancing o’er the green,
Thy waist sae jimp, thy limbs sae clean,
Thy tempting lips, thy roguish een –
By Heaven and Earth I love thee.
~
By night, by day, a-field, at hame,
The thoughts o’ thee my breast inflame;
And ay I muse and sing thy name,
I only live to love thee.
Tho’ I were doom’d to wander on,
Beyond the sea, beyond the sun,
Till my last, weary sand was run;
Till then –and then I love thee.
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