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Poems and Songs of Robert Burns

Chapter 6: Song—I Dream’d I Lay
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About This Book

The collection assembles lyrical songs, narrative poems, satirical pieces, epistles, epitaphs, and fragments that shift between convivial drinking verses, tender laments, and comic storytelling. Many lyrics were shaped to traditional airs and preserve vernacular speech, while longer works portray rural labor, domestic scenes, and compassionate encounters with animals. Satire targets religious hypocrisy and social pretension, and several poems take a direct, personal tone of moral reflection or affectionate address. The selections alternate moods and forms, emphasizing melodic phrasing and a versatile technical range.

Song—I Dream’d I Lay

I dream’d I lay where flowers were springing Gaily in the sunny beam; List’ning to the wild birds singing, By a falling crystal stream: Straight the sky grew black and daring; Thro’ the woods the whirlwinds rave; Tress with aged arms were warring, O’er the swelling drumlie wave. Such was my life’s deceitful morning, Such the pleasures I enjoyed: But lang or noon, loud tempests storming A’ my flowery bliss destroy’d. Tho’ fickle fortune has deceiv’d me— She promis’d fair, and perform’d but ill, Of mony a joy and hope bereav’d me— I bear a heart shall support me still.