Can harbor, dark, the selfish aim, Regardless of the tears, and unavailing pray'rs ! Perhaps this hour, in mis'ry's squalid nest, She strains your infant to her joyless breast, And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rocking blast! "Oh ye! who, sunk in beds of down, Feel not a want but what yourselves create, Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, Affliction's sons are brothers in distress; A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!" I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer And hail'd the morning with a cheer, But deep this truth impress'd my mind The heart benevolent and kind WINTER A DIRGE THE wintry west extends his blast, Or the stormy north sends driving forth While, tumbling brown, the burn comes down, And bird and beast in covert rest, And pass the heartless day. "The sweeping blast, the sky o'ercast," Let others fear, to me more dear The tempest's howl, it soothes my soul, My griefs it seems to join; Their fate resembles mine! Thou Pow'r Supreme, whose mighty scheme These woes of mine fulfil, Here, firm, I rest, they must be best, Because they are Thy will! Then all I want (Oh! do thou grant This one request of mine!) Since to enjoy thou dost deny, Assist me to resign. TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH, IN APRIL, 1786 WEE, modest, crimson-tippèd flow'r, Thou's met me in an evil hour; For I maun crush amang the stoure To spare thee now is past my pow'r, Alas! it's no thy neibor sweet, When upward-springing, blythe, to greet Cauld blew the bitter-biting north Scarce rear'd above the parent-earth The flaunting flow'rs our gardens yield, O' clod or stane, Adorns the histie stibble-field, Unseen, alane. There, in thy scanty mantle clad, Thou lifts thy unassuming head But now the share uptears thy bed, Such is the fate of artless maid, Till she, like thee, all soil'd, is laid Such is the fate of simple bard, On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd! Of prudent lore, Till billows rage, and gales blow hard, Such fate to suffering worth is giv❜n, To mis'ry's brink, Till wrench'd of ev'ry stay but Heav'n, |