Blogging
late today, but what a beauty of an extended metaphor! And see the last line of the antepenultimate
stanza J—
________________________________________________________
To A
Mountain Daisy, On turning down with the Plough, in April, 1786
By Robert
Burns
Wee,
modest crimson-tipped flow'r,
Thou's
met me in an evil hour;
For I
maun crush amang the stoure
Thy
slender stem:
To spare
thee now is past my pow'r,
Thou
bonie gem.
Alas!
it's no thy neibor sweet,
The bonie
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;
But thou,
beneath the random bield
O' clod or
stane,
Adorns
the histie stibble field,
Unseen,
alane.
There, in
thy scanty mantle clad,
Thy
snawie 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 plough-share drives elate,
Full on
thy bloom,
Till
crush'd beneath the furrow's weight,
Shall be
thy doom!
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