On Miss Wilhelmina Alexander - Robert Burns

’Twas even—the dewy fields were green,
 On every blade the pearls hang;
The zephyr wanton’d round the bean,
 And bore its fragrant sweets alang:
 In ev’ry glen the mavis sang,
All nature list’ning seem’d the while,
 Except where greenwood echoes rang,
Amang the braes o’ Ballochmyle.

With careless step I onward stray’d,
 My heart rejoic’d in nature’s joy,
When, musing in a lonely glade,
 A maiden fair I chanc’d to spy:
 Her look was like the morning’s eye,
Her air like nature’s vernal smile:
 Perfection whisper’d, passing by,
“Behold the lass o’ Ballochmyle!”

Fair is the morn in flowery May,
 And sweet is night in autumn mild;
When roving thro’ the garden gay,
 Or wand’ring in the lonely wild:
 But woman, nature’s darling child!
There all her charms she does compile;
 Even there her other works are foil’d
By the bonie lass o’ Ballochmyle.

O, had she been a country maid,
 And I the happy country swain,
Tho’ shelter’d in the lowest shed
 That ever rose on Scotland’s plain!
 Thro’ weary winter’s wind and rain,
With joy, with rapture, I would toil;
 And nightly to my bosom strain
The bonie lass o’ Ballochmyle.

Then pride might climb the slipp’ry steep,
 Where frame and honours lofty shine;
And thirst of gold might tempt the deep,
 Or downward seek the Indian mine:
 Give me the cot below the pine,
To tend the flocks or till the soil;
 And ev’ry day have joys divine
With the bonie lass o’ Ballochmyle.

---

Robert Burns (1759 – 1796) Scotland

Source: BBC - Robert Burns - Works