I’ll bury nae heid like an ostrich’s,
Nor yet believe my een and naething else.
My senses may advise me, but I’ll be
Mysel’ nae maitter what they tell’s….

I ha’e nae doot some foreign philosopher
Has wrocht a system oot to justify
A’ this: but I’m a Scot wha blin’ly follows
Auld Scottish instincts, and I winna try.

For I’ve nae faith in ocht I can explain,
And stert whaur the philosophers leave aff,
Content to glimpse its loops I dinna ettle
To land the sea serpent’s sel’ wi’ ony gaff.

Like staundin’ water in a pocket o’
Impervious clay I pray I’ll never be,
Cut aff and self-sufficient, but let reenge
Heichts o’ the lift and benmaist deeps o’ sea.

Water! Water! There was owre muckle o’t
In yonder whisky, sae I’m in deep water
(And gin I could wun hame I’d be in het,
For even Jean maun natter, natter, natter)….

And in the toon that I belang tae
—What tho’ts Montrose or Nazareth?—
Helplessly the folk continue
To lead their livin’ death!…

*At darknin’ hings abune the howff
 A weet and wild and eisenin’ air.
 Spring’s spirit wi’ its waesome sough
 Rules owre the drucken stramash there.

 And heich abune the vennel’s pokiness,
 Whaur a’ the white-weshed cottons lie;
 The Inn’s sign blinters in the mochiness,
 And lood and shrill the bairnies cry.

 The hauflins ’yont the burgh boonds
 Gang ilka nicht, and a’ the same,
 Their bonnets cocked; their bluid that stounds
 Is playin’ at a fine auld game.

 And on the lochan there, hauf-herted
 Wee screams and creakin’ oar-locks soon’,
 And in the lift, heich, hauf-averted,
 The mune looks owre the yirdly roon’.

 And ilka evenin’, derf and serious
 (Jean ettles nocht o’ this, puir lass),
 In liquor, raw yet still mysterious,
 A’e freend’s aye mirrored in my glass.

 Ahint the sheenin’ coonter gruff
 Thrang barmen ding the tumblers doun
 “In vino veritas” cry rough
 And reid-een’d fules that in it droon

*From the Russian of Alexander Blok.

from A Drunk Man Looks at Throbbing Thistle