Keith• Show poetry

Rhyme all the time. To rhyme is not a crime. Or not quite all the time. Sometimes free verse is fine.

Here are some Scottish proverbs which deserve a wider audience.

A' ae oo. This means - everything works towards a common end. It is meant to be based on a conversation between a shopkeeper and a customer about a piece of tartan hanging in the shop and shows how much the Scots love their vowels.

Customer (asking about the tartan) Oo? (Wool?)
Shopkeeper Aye, oo (Yes, it's made of wool)
Customer A' oo? (Is it all wool?)
Shopkeeper Aye, a' oo (Yes, all wool)
Customer A' ae oo? (Is it all made of the same wool?)
Shopkeeper Aye, a' ae oo (Yes, it's all made of the same wool)

Hence: A' ae oo - we're all working towards the same goal.

A' are no friends that speak us fair (You can't trust everyone who pays you a compliment)

A baldy heid is soon shaven (A little bit of work is easily completed)

A beltless bairn canna lie (A very young child is too innocent to tell untruths)

A blind man has nae need o' a lookin'- glass (Don't be vain about your appearance)

A'cats are grey i' the dark (As above)

A' complain o' want o' siller, but nane a want o' sense (If people were cleverer, they wouldn't spend so much time complaining)

A cruel king ne'er reigns long

A foul fit maks a fu' wame (If you're not afraid of physical hard work, you'll never be hungry

A gude friend is worth many relations

A gude lawyer may be an ill neighbour

All hechtis should be haudin' (Always keep your promises)

Aye in a hurry, aye ahint (More haste, less speed)

When I was listing my favourite author/poems/poets, I forgot all about Burns. Now, everyone's heard of Rabbie Burns, but I'm not sure how many people realise the deep thought he was capable of. I am going to quote the whole of 'To a Mouse' here because I really think that its excellence is hard to beat. Most people know "Wee sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie" and John Steinbeck used "Of Mice and Men" to remind us that our "best-laid schemes".."gang aft agley". However, if you read the whole poem, you find that Burns goes much further than simple pity and fellow-feeling for the mouse, and, by extension, the natural World. In the final verse, he reverses the whole argument and lets us see that the mouse is much more fortunate then Man, because it lives only in the Present. It will deal with the destruction of its nest, whereas Man can only spend time worrying about the Future and regretting the errors of the Past.
I honestly still get chills up and down my spine when I read this, and it has the power, as all good poetry should, to move me to tears.

To A Mouse

on turning her up in her nest, with the plough, November 1785

Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin and chase thee,
Wi' murd'ring pattle!

I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle,
At me, thy poor earth-born companion,
An' fellow mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen icker in a thrave
'S a sma' request:
I'll get a blessin wi' the lave,
And never miss't!

Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
O' foggage green!
An' bleak December's winds ensuin,
Baith snell and keen!

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste,
An weary Winter comin' fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter past
Out thro' thy cell

That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble,
But house or hald,
To thole the Winter's sleety dribble
An' cranreuch cauld!

But Mousie, thou art no thy lane
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes o' Mice an' Men
Gang aft a-gley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain,
For promis'd joy.

Still thou art blest, compared wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But, Och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!

Now, in my opinion, these few verses stand comparison with anything written by Shakespeare, or anyone else for that matter. And they are the work of a self-educated ploughman who spent most of his life carousing and fathering illegitimate children. There's hope for us all!

I would like to present some riddles, written in Scots by William Soutar. Now, you may be able to find the answers by looking on the web, but I doubt it. Let me know if you work any of them out. Just two to be going on with.

My head is in the hicht
Hills are atween my feet
My faither is the licht
My mither is the weet

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Here's an easier one:

It has an e'e but canna see:
It stands richt tipper-taed:
It can mak a man get up and rin;
Yet we chain it wi' a threed.

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There are another 38 of them, if you're interested. But you must work out these two first.

I've decided to add another two seeing its the new year:

A’ about and a’ abune;
Clear eneuch afore the e’en;
Cauld eneuch upon the skin:
Yet wi’ hands ye canna grip it;
And wi’ shears ye canna snip it;
And wi’ raips ye canna wip it

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Its body is water; its banes is a breath;
And lightly it walks on the wind:
But the hand that wud tak it maun aye be its death;
And the corpie be gey far to find.

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