Robbie Burns

There is a statue of Robbie Burns in the park near my campus and spitting distance to the eye doctor's shop. We are walking through the park when we come up to a man with a pipe studying the statue. Somehow he strikes up a converation (well it is Halifax). As a child he was a fisherman with his father who could light a pipe in all sorts of weather. Later he went to school to become a folklorist and still teaches from time to time though now he is retired and is staying in Halifax while his wife is in hospital - I suspect he is a little lonely and misses home. But he loves Robbie Burns and loves to visit this statue.

When he hears that Mike was born on robbie burns day he knows that he has an appreciative audience and proceeds to explain the pictures on each side of the statue - they each represent one of Burn's poems - Auld lang syne, Tam o Shanter, a Cotters Saturday Night and To a Mouse. Tam o Shanter - the one with the witches - reminds me of ichabod crane and in the dark drizzle it seems even a little more scary.

I learn that apparently Burns loved women - many women. The man feels that Burns loved each one truly but somehow just loved too many. ha ha.

The man's favourite poem is the scene on the back "To a mouse". Even 300 hundred years ago Burns understood the relationship between humans and nature and understood too that mankind was wrecking this relationship.


To a Mouse
(Whilst ploughing on a November day, Burns ruined the nest of a field mouse. He ponders why the creature runs away in such terror)

"Oh, tiny timorous forlorn beast,
Oh why the panic in your breast ?
You need not dart away in haste
To some corn-rickI'd never run and chase thee,
With murdering stick.

I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken nature's social union,
And justifies that ill opinion
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor earth-born companion,
And fellow mortal.

I do not doubt you have to thieve;
What then?
Poor beastie you must live;
One ear of corn that's scarcely missed
Is small enough:
I'll share with you all this year's grist,
Without rebuff.

Thy wee bit housie too in ruin,
Its fragile walls the winds have strewn,
And you've nothing new to build a new one,
Of grasses green;
And bleak December winds ensuing,
Both cold and keen.
You saw the fields laid bare and waste,
And weary winter coming fast,
And cosy there beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash; the cruel ploughman crushed
Thy little cell.
Your wee bit heap of leaves and stubble,
Had cost thee many a weary nibble.
Now you're turned out for all thy trouble
Of house and home
To bear the winter's sleety drizzle,
And hoar frost cold.

But, mousie, thou art not alane,
In proving foresight may be in vain,
The best laid schemes of mice and men,
Go oft astray,
And leave us nought but grief and pain,
To rend our day.
Still thou art blessed, compared with me!
The present only touches thee,
But, oh, I backward cast my eye
On prospects drear,
And forward, though I cannot see,
I guess and fear.

statue can be seen here http://www.mikecampbell.net/robert_burns.htm