Poem by Thomas Blacklock

A Letter from Thomas Blacklock to the Author, Respecting Burns

Dear madam, hear a suppliant’s pray’r,
And on our bard your censure spare,
Whase bluntness slights ilk trivial care
	Of mock decorum:
Since for a bard its unko rare
	To look before him.

With joy to praise, with freedom blame,
To ca’ folk by their Christian name,
To speak his mind, but fear or shame,
	Was at his fashion:
But virtue his eternal flame,
	His ruling passion.

This by-past time, as fame reports,
The author’s Muse was out of sorts,
And in some freak, perhaps in dorts,
	Or ablins spleen:
She paid her visists at the shorts,
	An’ lang between.

But, when your sang approach’d his ear,
How fain he was, you need na speer,
The smiles of heaven, whilk nature chear,
	Were never brighter:
Na sudden tide of worldly gear
	Sae gars him flighter.

But lang enough, perhaps o’er lang,
I draw an auld man’s feeble sang;
Yet, tho’ in this ye ca’ me wrang,
	Perhaps na blate;
I still maun ask, for a’ my thrang,
	ALICIA’S fate.

1. Song. Inscribed to a Friend. In imitation of Shenstone
2. An Hymn to Divine Love. In Imitation of Spenser
3. A Pastoral Song
4. An Epitaph, on a Favourite Lap-Dog
5. On Punch

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