Long Braes Poems

FIRST MOVEMENT (Minor Key)

Times such as these test body soul and mind
So should our thoughts be pain and dark confined
Or loosed to concentrate on brighter things
Like furry puppies, flowers and girls on swings

In this bright...

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Inspired by the painting "Highland Lassie" (1871) by Thomas Faed.

(Verse One; In introduction to Cailin)
Walkin' on the highways, searchin' down the byways,
Tromps a lonely figure on the Highland roads;
Peerin' from the Highdown, breezin' through the...

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The early hours of a Wednesday morning in a small country town.
An 18-year-old boy struggles to sleep
He had pain so bad 
all he could do was weep 
he, knee was so painful
he had to go...

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“Auld Lang Syne” - the most-sung New Year's Eve song

Courtesy Robert Burns
circa  (25 January 1759 – 21 July 1796)
the National Bard,
Bard of Ayrshire
and the Ploughman Poet.

Two hundred sixty one orbitz elapsed
since brief existence of...

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Auld Lange Syne
by Robert Burns
modern English translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
And days for which we pine?

For times we shared, my darling,
Days passed, once...

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THE NIGHT THAT RABBIE VISITED ME
One night in spring  I couldn't sleep      I heard knocking on  the door
I got out of bed, walked to the window to have...

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Lo' beneigh' the random bield, bewails upo' the leaf
An' lea'e me naught but grief and pain, as moone breaks through the heath
Upo' the gilded braes we kissed, luve sang a zephyrs cry
Where say, my luve,...

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TIME   AND   PLACE


Spring is found in the Lowland valleys with gowan-filled braes of Scotland
When the early-reaching flowers bloom in cool freshness,  and
The air is bracing and always new-washed-glass clean ...

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SEASONAL    PLACES


Spring is found in the Lowland valleys with gowan-filled braes of Scotland
When the early-reaching flowers bloom in cool freshness,  and
The air is bracing and always new-washed-glass clean  -
With the...

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Majestic, barren, rock-cropped braes ascend—
Arrayed, green-clad, in heather, gorse, and fern—
As mid-day, misty, dark’ning clouds descend
To cold-embrace each soaring tor and burn.

From heights unseen a torrent cascades free,
Unfettered into deep Ben Nevis’ glen;
Then onwards toward...

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The Haggis lives a solitary life
On mountainsides and braes
Foraging, for slugs and snails
Is how he spends his days

But come the rutting season
A change in him you’ll find
He’ll go out searching, high and low
For others of...

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Being a Scot I can be a little biased
but I have been here all of my days
at first hand, I've seen this land total
having walked over many banks and braes

Scotland by its occupants seem drab
tending...

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Ye ancient land O’ bonnie hue
A bonnie haze on lochs of black
Divide the colour, take me back
To wash my eyes with Fall, imbue
The highlands with a McCulloch hand
Take me back to Autumnland

Softly, softly toes on...

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A angry sky, as cauld as Loch Lomon'
fair drew me out from cot o' peat, an' bed.
The wolves wus wailin', an' thund'r respond'd
Ah gather'd tam, me tartan, an' dug Red.
To  'orse ah took an'...

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As the wind rolls cold of the mountain plain
As the Hindu Kush rises like skyscrapers to Gods name
But these are not my mountains and the wind is not the same
So as my plane takes off...

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Above the brightening vale in sun reborn
The barrow braes are clothed as we behold
Amid green pines the gorse and broom adorn 
With blossoms swathing heath in cloth of gold

Below: the tarn’s once dark and baleful...

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