Fugitive Poetry. 1600–1878/The Auld Man's Lament

The Auld Man's Lament.

My Beltane o' life and my gay days are gane,And now I am feckless and dowie alane:And my Lammas o' life, wi' its wearifu' years,Like Lammas, has brought me its floods and its tears.

Full threescore and ten years the gowan has spread,Since first o'er the greensward wi' light foot I sped;And threescore and ten times the bluebells hae blawn,Since to pu' them I first spankit blythe o'er the lawn.

The burn-banks I lo'ed when a callan to range,And the ferny clad braes, a' seem eerie and strange;The burn seems less clear, and the lift nae sae blue,But its aiblins my auld een that dinna tell true.

The mates o' my young days are a' wede awa',They are missed in the meadow and missed in the shaw;Like the swallows, they've fled when youth's warm days are gane,And I'm left like a winged ane a' winter alane.

It seems short to look back since my Peggy was young,Then bonnie she leukit, and blythely she sung;But my Peggy has left me, and gane wi' the lave,And the night-wind moans dreary o'er Peggy's lone grave.

See yon aged hawthorn that bends o'er the burn!Its wind-scattered blossoms can never return;They are swept to the sea, o'er the wild roarin' linn,Like my friends wha hae flourished and died ane by ane.