Burns like Ice

[f4f3]

They say that this is the most depressing day of the year, when all our hearts turn inwards, when we think of old wounds and old loves, when most breakups happen. I see no reason to argue.

Burns has words for it. A poet always does, and that's a curse, as well as a blessing, for the words come from the experience, and the experience might not be worth the words. Except to a poet it is, and that's what makes them different from me and thee, dear reader. "Never trust a writer", I told someone today. It was said in jest, but it's a joke with a sting. Hurt and pain, anger and hate, are all food for songs, as much as love is. I'd hate to be a writer's mate, and find the meal once set down in love or pain served up on the page for all to read.

One of the things it's hard to share about Burns is that so many of his poems are lyrical,  meant to be sung. The words of Ae Fond Kiss are Burns, but the voice singing them in my head is Eddi Reader's, and I can't hear it  without a tear. Even now. Especially now.

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever [ae = one]
Ae fareweel, alas, for ever!
Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee,
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.

Who shall say that Fortune grieves him,
While the star of hope she leaves him?
Me, nae cheerful twinkle lights me;
Dark despair around benights me.

I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy,
Nothing can resist my Nancy:
For to see her was to love her;
Love but her, and love for ever.

Had we never loved sae kindly,
Had we never loved sae blindly,
Nor never met - nor never parted,
We would never have been sae broken-hearted.

Fare-thee-weel, my first and fairest
Fare-thee-week, my best and dearest
Thine be ilka joy and treasure, [ilka = every]
Peace, Enjoyment, Love and Pleasure!

Ae fond kiss, and then we sever
Ae fareweel, alas, for ever
Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee,
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.

Comments

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

I think that's my favourite Burns

[rparvaaz.livejournal.com]

Hurt and pain, anger and hate, are all food for songs, as much as love is. I'd hate to be a writer's mate, and find the meal once set down in love or pain served up on the page for all to read.

You're being unfair to writers and poets, methinks. Not all bare their lives in public, and plenty who aren't writers get ghost writers to bare *their* lives for all to salivate over.

Human experiences are universal, afterall, and plenty of times only the writer knows where one particular emotion or experience or line came from...

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

Maybe I was being harsh... But I don't think a writer gets to chose what comes out of the mill, anymore than they chose what goes in. I wasn't even thinking of the kiss and tell, or the grin and bare it brigade, so much as the voyeuristic feel I've had from reading the poetry, and occasionally the prose, of friends, when I've known something of the circumstances around it.