Classic Poem

ADDRESSED TO THOSE BOOKSELLERS OF EDINBURGH WHO HAVE PURCHASED THE COPYRIGHT OF THE FOLLOWING POEMS .

I.

Ye who risk cash upon my pen,
Spendthrifts! — rare epithet for men
Of Scotland's frugal nation! —
To you these doleful strains are sent,
Called in your country a " Lament, "
In mine a " Lamentation. "

II.

" Waesucks! " your critics soon may spier,
" What gars this Suthron venture here,
Wi' our braw bards a coper?
Hoot, hoot, awa'! we a' decree
His tales too dear at a bawbee,
And him an interloper! "

III.

But if from some, in fancy rich,
Whose flights disdain my crambo pitch,
Ye purchased English sonnets,
Your Scotch Apollos, long since dead ,
Would all lift up an angry head
With laurel in their bonnets.

IV.

Ossian's patched spectre — on his breast
A Gaelic nightmare's hoof impressed —
The rhymes would rave a curse on;
In metaphors from Homer's lore,
And tropes from David's psalms, good store,
Supplied by James Macpherson.

V.

Old Ramsay's ghost would clodhop forth,
The dead Guarini of the North,
Scotch pastoral's rara avis ;
Cramp London dialect to scout,
And every barbarous verse without
One lavrock, merle , or mavis .

VI.

And thou, " O Jemmy Thomson! " though
In London " Jemmy Thomson, O! "
Thou writ'st for weighty reasons!
Thy shade would o'er the stanzas fling
A blight in publication's spring,
And blast them through the seasons.

VII.

Full many more would rend the tomb:
Weak Mallet, able Douglas Home,
And Burns, with brains sans knowledge,
Who carolled (would he carolled now!)
Methinks, as pleasantly at plough
As Beattie sang in college.

VIII.

But would they " burst their cerements? " No!
'Twere strange if they should rise, and go
Afresh to couplet-chiming!
What bards would be such silly slaves
To quit their independent graves,
And trust again to rhyming?

IX.

Well, if dead poets would not rise,
What would the living do? Be wise
And generous in their dealings:
Frank genius never would refuse
To hail and cheer a stranger muse
Of kindred thoughts and feelings.

X.

Would he in whose effusions sweet
Sublimity and pathos meet,
Depress his venturous brothers?
He that Hope's Pleasures well must know
(He had not else adorned them so),
Could he crush hope in others?

XI.

No; nor would he whose minstrel trance
Squanders new charms on stale romance,
While Scotia's harp he seizes:
He who to border feuds imparts
The true poetic fire by starts —
And smoke — whene'er he pleases.

XII.

But bards like him surmount control.
When Dryden's cataract of soul
Impetuously gushes,
What rubbish oft he drives along
Down his Niagara of song,
While grand the torrent rushes!

XIII.

As Scotland's sons who wear the bays
Observe how England greets their lays,
And welcomes them delighted,
The sister Muses, they agree,
Should, like the rose and thistle, be
In sister lands united.

XIV.

Since therefore northward of the Tweed
To geniuses of Cockney breed
Such kindness would be granted,
E'en my coarse, macaronic style
May here and there excite a smile,
And little else is wanted.

XV.

Then ye who have this bargain made,
Cheer up, braw laddies! — who's afraid?
And thus my " Lamentation, "
Which, starting on a tristful plan,
In deep despondency began,
Ends like a consolation.