I am like Burns, and ony wench
Can ser’ me for a time.
Licht’s in them a’—in some a sun,
In some the merest skime.

I’m no’ like Burns, and weel I ken,
Tho’ ony wench can ser’,
It’s no’ through mony but through yin
That ony man wuns fer….

I weddit thee frae fause love, lass,
To free thee and to free mysel’;
But man and wumman tied for life
True can be and truth can tell.

Pit ony couple in a knot
They canna lowse and needna try,
And mair o’ love at last they’ll ken
—If ocht!—than joy’ll alane descry.

For them as for the beasts, my wife,
A’s fer frae dune when pleesure’s owre,
And coontless difficulties gar
Ilk hert discover a’ its power.

I dinna say that bairns alane
Are true love’s task—a sairer task
Is aiblins to create oorsels
As we can be—it’s that I ask.

Create oorsels, syne bairns, syne race.
Sae on the cod I see’t in you
Wi’ Maidenkirk to John o’ Groats
The bosom that you draw me to.

And nae Scot wi’ a wumman lies,
But I am he and ken as ’twere
A stage I’ve passed as he maun pass’t,
Gin he grows up, his way wi’ her!…

A’thing wi’ which a man
Can intromit’s a wumman,
And can, and s’ud, become
As intimate and human.

And Jean’s nae mair my wife
Than whisky is at times,
Or munelicht or a thistle
Or kittle thochts or rhymes.

He’s no’ a man ava’,
And lacks a proper pride,
Gin less than a’ the warld
Can ser’ him for a bride!…

from A Drunk Man Looks at Throbbing Thistle