Classic Poem

Robert Burns

[FRAGMENT 1]

Full loud & fresh crows Chaunticlere!
The Orient like an opening rose
Warm'd in a bridal bosom, glows
Before the sunrise breathing near,
And mounting in its golden gear.

Full loud and fresh crows Chaunticlere,
For in the van of dawn he crows;
And as a full-plumed general may,
He marshals in the pomp of day.

High on his sovereign " steaming heap"
He springs & plants his scornful spurs:
Crowing as he would kill meek sleep;
Till all the drowsy farmyard stirs,
And bustles round him and about him;
Like brisk courtiers met together:
And laggards warm i' the downy feather,
Heartily wish the world without him!

See how he crows, and swells his throat,
And shakes his comb, & lifts his head!
Pride o' the morn! unwelcome note
To all who love to lie in bed
And slumber in the arms of sloth:
Loathe to leave it, & leave it loth;
Or else forlorn and lingering stay,
Feeling fast bounden to obey,
Albeit they'd give a peck of barley
Just for one more smooth-dozing parley.

See how he crows, & crests his head!
As tho' the ruddy daylight from it
Down on the world he shook & shed!
As tho' 'twere some red-tethered comet
Caught as a crown for him, as it sped
One dawnward night thro' the streaming air,
Henceforth men from all sleep to scare.

See how he crows, and claps his plumes
So glossy grand, as tho' 'twere he
From whom the panting East resumes
Its gradual broadening pageantry
Each morn, while in the breezy front
He struts in his ancestral wont.
As tho' 'twere he who led that light
So subtle-soft & stealing-bright,
Thro' each slowly quickening bar
Of sleepy cloud; and thence invaded
All the wide arch of dawn, which lay
A rainbow's span, and mixt array:
Drenching the quivering morning star,
That like a fair sweet bather waded
Up to the throat in lucent colour:
Flinging aside each dewy tress
To show its Angel nakedness
More smilingly; till fading duller,
Deep in the Heavens it receded,
Lessening distant, dim, and gray,
And beckoning upward, pass'd away,
By many of this earth unheeded.

And crow! and with the thought sublime,
Flatter thy soul, O Chaunticlere!
Prince of the vigour-breathing prime,
And lord of morning's pearly ear.
Crow while the woods & coverts wake,
And with a dewy rustling coolness,
Breathe moist breath, & while the lake
Mirrors the Orient in its fulness.
Shadowing in the brushing breeze
So timid-chill, its chill blue eye,
That holds, & to the dawning sky
The bird of dawn ascending sees.

Crow, while the lush-leaved forest sighing,
Whispers in its dream remote!
And in its depths far echoes crying,
Faintly renew each morning note:
Running tiptoe from dell to dell
Hand to mouth: & in the well
Where Summer's green, & Autumn's gold,
Dances its shadow refreshfully,
The maiden light to bathe is bold,
And the blithe dawning dips with glee.
And while long forest vistas gaze
Less darkly thro' their natural haze,
Down on the dewy glistening valleys
Where with dim shapes old Memory dallies.
And while quick forest creatures start
To pasture, and the stately hart,
Leaving his thick green couching dingles,
His antlers with the morning mingles.

And crow, and warm'd with adulation,
Crown with thy plumes the glowing prime!
Crow from thy day-dispensing station,
And on each topping crow still climb
With loftier crow! while over range
Of farm, & holt, and weedy grange,
Cock answers cock throughout the nation.
Cock answers cock with shrill alarms,
Calling all England up to arms.

Who can resist? It is resistless!
Lads and lasses gay & listless;
Busy women & brawny men
Up they leap & out they pour;
Out with the robin & the wren
From the wide-swinging cottage door.
And down the rosy orchards some,
And some along the fields & roads,
And some to neighbour friends' abodes,
Hurry, & all the breezes come
With grey-chin gossip, and bursting jest,
And pranks of yesternight confest,
So tricksily play'd: and following after,
Bubbling rounds of ringing laughter.

Vain is the pillowy debate
Now held 'twixt farmer's wife & farmer;
Who every moment waxing warmer,
Curse that cock as a cruel Fate:
That cock, the Sultan of such hens
As never before hatcht chicks by tens:
Confound him as a red-capt Fury
Worse than half the plagues of Jewry.

Vain is the prayer in anguish prest
From every sad & balmless breast
Awaking with a start, to what
It numbly feels, but has forgot,
For further peacefulness, that fleeing,
Buoys no more the weight of being.

Vainly the silken dame would hold
Soft dalliance with her dreams, & mould
Creation to her dainty pleasure
In the close-curtain'd lifeless leisure.
The voice that cudgels ghosts, can pierce
Keen as the light her fortrest shutter:
And in her ear full loud & fierce,
Its dreaded disenchantment utter.
Giving each foolish phantom chase,
And making what seem'd fond & fair,
Fade off chapfall'n, shamed, & bare,
With long-drawn dolorous grimace.

Sir Chaunticlere in his martial ire
Forgets that oily unctuous gloze
Such dames and damosels require
In dealings with the world: he crows
Regardless of all womankind;
And to the amorous yawn is blind,
And to the pretty pout of anger,
The warm voluptuous rose-lipt langour.
Fine-gentleman is he; refined,
And mighty in appreciation;
But both his manners & his mind
Are Eastern, East his education.
And thus, albeit he may admire
Her charms, & flush with flattering fire,
A woman's will to him is null
As much as to the Great Mogul.

What! tho' a thousand perfumed sighs
Reproach him, & old Time, the traitor,
Feigns to forsake him, half defies
And veering, loiters, loiters later,
In those rich-cushion'd roseate rooms,
Where beauty so divinely blooms.
What! tho' ten thousand magic tips
Of fair pink fingers coax & wheedle,
And plead with the twin-budding lips:
Each finger a magnetic needle,
Stretching his progress to detain,
And of its own attractions vain.

It matters not: he hath a mission,
This Chaunticlere! and Beauty spares not:
Mindful of that old tradition
Which is his knighthood's stain, he cares not
Even tho' in his zeal, he vexes
The Cream & Lover of the Sexes.

For he, the sluggard, 'twas — no other —
Who first made Love of light ashamed,
And of Himself, what time his Mother
Blusht till the eyes of gods were tamed,
And in that Crimsoning distress,
Saw nothing but her loveliness!

He who; winking at his post,
Betray'd the Secret to the sun: —
Alas! why scares he now the roost
Ere half the enamour'd night is done?
Faithless still to Love he seems,
In both his treacherous extremes.

Faithless to Love! as if avenging
The hour of his corporeal changing.
False to young lovers at the least;
In warning thus the jealous East —
To trouble the consenting moon,
And wither her fair fond face so soon!

Ah! cock; grey cock! on what a sea
Thou callest us to embark each morrow,
Grey cock! with what a little key
Thou openest worlds of joy and sorrow!

It matters not! he hath a mission!
And thrice himself that mission makes him.
And terrible will be Time's contrition
When he in evil hour forsakes him.

Lured, it may be, awhile to linger
Above a lovely lip or finger.
Limp as a reed, with abject chin,
He on his scythe will loll & lean:
While to the clarion morning rolls
Her Ocean of immortal Souls
Beyond him in that Isle of sands
Where, sinking and alone, he stands;
Feeling himself, in quaking awe,
One meal for young Oblivion's maw.

" And crow, " cries Willie, from his pillow
Rising with wide-waking lids,
As if from sleep's pale-ebbing billow
Heaved: crow on, creation bids!
Nor ever rearward let me lag.

Thus rich in metaphors, he rises.
What is it all his soul surprises
When in the garden walk he hears
From one not rich in metaphors,
A fair — " Good morning, Willie mine!
" Awake yet? " and his boy comes running
Out of the wood that skirts the meadow,
The meadow sweet with couching kine:
And when he sees dear Joan sunning
The baby in her arms, her shadow
Broad on the peach-wall, & her gown
Tuckt up to shun the gray dawn-dews
That shine upon her tripping shoes
Fresh from the meadow-grass unmown?

She laughs; & little Willie musters
Pocketsful of reproachful clusters,
No visionary kernels in them:
Boasting the work he had to win them,
With toiling up & toppling down,
From the brookside hazels brown.
And looking like a young barbarian
Glowering with haste & heat,
While in the lap of little Marian,
He tumbles the whole tawny treat,
Gathered chiefly to provide her;
And sprawls with pleasure close beside her;
And thro' the open window plies
Hot skirmish with the shells he shies,
While, ever and anon, he cries
" Up, Father, up! rise, Father, rise! "

And soon comes Willie to his call:
And on sly Joan's mouth he sets
A kiss to dam the laughter jets
That toss him like a fountain ball.
A kiss he gives her with good will,
And draws her to him close, but still,
Like water thro' a moonlight weir,
Through her white teeth the laughter clear,
The streaming chimes of laughter fall.
" — What, Willie? You! " and Willie hums
Deaf tunes, and on the bloomy plums
Dilates a wealthy eye, till fairly
Vanquisht, he joins her loud & rarely;
Laughs from his heart, & thus securely,
With her own weapons foils her surely.

Down the old garden wall they go:
By nectarine trees, and apricots,
And plums and peaches rail'd in row:
And strawberry beds with the freckled spots
Of Autumn on their leaves; and apples
That the gay dancing sunlight dapples,
And with its kiss the dew doth wipe
From every cheek so rosily ripe,
Or ripely yellow. Down the wall
Patcht with old moss, and at the top
Weed-grown, they go: bent pear-trees tall,
Invite them, and the ruddy crop
Sweet-smelling from the orchard, becks
As floats the gust in gleaming specks.

Tenderly round her little waist
One arm he folds, and timidly
As Egypt's sacred priests displaced
The veil of a panting mystery,
He lifts her shawl where, huddled warm,
Lay the sleepy dimpled form: —
Gazing until the child had sent
On all his face its infancy
Of peace: and ever tenderly,
And with soft fingers reverent,
Further aside the shawl he pusht,
And on the one breast heaving bare
And shrinking from the guilty air,
Gazed; and with such a blush she blusht,
While sheltering with the pearl she bore him,
It brought their bridal days before him,
Vividly sweet, albeit the fruit
[Passage incomplete ]

[FRAGMENT 2]

" — But, Joan, where is Bessy? " — " She
" In younger wood has walked with me,
" And Marian & her brother too,
" He left her there to look for you,
" All haste, for taking bags of nuts. "
And looking where the river cuts
The meadow like a shining sickle,
Hard by the wood in winding curve —
He saw her coming, & each nerve
[?] tingled to think how fickle
The peopled haunts of childhood were
To stricken hearts: the fair Romance
Whose life is aye a flying glance.
A vista's glimpse: how rich they were
When Nature in her motherly truth
Paid homage to the strength of youth!
Fallen from them, not they from her,
Was this poor child; and he could see
That like all frail inconstancy
When others fail from stedfastness,
They had not spared reproach: —
To press
Upon her shrinking cheek at meeting,
The privilege of a brother's greeting,
Was Willie's instant act, and Joan
Put in her arms the fondling pet:
No kinder thing could she have done:
And Marian at her side did fret
For kisses; & little Willie gently
Took her by one cradling hand
And lookt into her eyes intently.
Language he could not understand,
He read there; and, unconsciously,
The sweetness of a mystery
His young imagination fann'd.
For, to a fervent boy, is nought
So fascinating as the grief
Of woman: fresh unbudding thought
May gaze upon the blighted leaf
And nothing see but wondrous hues:
And in her eyes, with no bright dews
Compassionate, the boy beheld
And loved her for it, sorrow unprobed;
[Passage incomplete ]