Poem by Robert Burns

The Lament

Occasioned by the unfortunate issue of 
    a Friend’s Amour.

O THOU pale Orb, that silent shines,
  While care-untroubled mortals sleep!
Thou seest a wretch that inly pines,
  And wanders here to wail and weep!
With woe I nightly vigils keep,
  Beneath thy wan, unwarming beam;
And mourn, in lamentation deep,
  How life and love are all a dream.

I joyless view thy rays adorn
  The faintly-marked, distant hill:
I joyless view thy trembling horn,
  Reflected in the gurgling rill:
My fondly-fluttering heart, be still!
  Thou busy pow’r, Remembrance, cease!
Ah! must the agonizing thrill
  For ever bar returning peace!

No idly-feign’d poetic pains,
  My sad love-lorn lamentings claim;
No shepherd’s pipe-Arcadian strains;
  No fabled tortures, quaint and tame:
The plighted faith, the mutual flame,
  The oft attested Pow’rs above,
The promis’d father’s tender name-
  These were the pledges of my love!

Encircled in her clasping arms,
  How have the raptur’d moments flown!
How have I wish’d for fortune’s charms,
  For her dear sake, and her’s alone!
And must I think it! is she gone,
  My secret heart’s exulting boast?
And does she heedless hear my groan?
  And is she ever, ever lost?

Oh! can she bear so base a heart,
  So lost to honour, lost to truth,
As from the fondest lover part,
  The plighted husband of her youth?
Alas! life’s path may be unsmooth!
  Her way may lie thro’ rough distress!
Then who her pangs and pains will soothe,
  Her sorrows share, and make them less?

Ye winged hours that o’er us past,
  Enraptur’d more, the more enjoy’d,
Your dear remembrance in my breast
  My fondly-treasur’d thoughts employ’d.
That breast, how dreary now, and void,
  For her too scanty once of room!
Ev’n ev’ry ray of hope destroy’d,
  And not a wish to gild the gloom!

The morn that warns th’ approaching day
  Awakes me up to toil and woe:
I see the hours in long array,
  That I must suffer, lingering slow.
Full many a pang, and many a throe,
  Keen recollection’s direful train,
Must wring my soul, ere Phoebus, low,
  Shall kiss the distant western main.

And when my nightly couch I try,
  Sore-harass’d out with care and grief,
My toil-beat nerves, and tear-worn eye,
  Keep watchings with the nightly thief:
Or if I slumber, Fancy, chief,
  Reigns, haggard-wild, in sore affright:
Ev’n day, all-bitter, brings relief
  From such a horror-breathing night.

O thou bright Queen, who o’er th’ expanse
  Now highest reign’st, with boundless sway!
Oft has thy silent-marking glance
  Observ’d us, fondly-wand’ring, stray!
The time, unheeded, sped away,
  While love’s luxurious pulse beat high,
Beneath thy silver-gleaming ray,
  To mark the mutual-kindling eye.

O scenes in strong remembrance set!
  Scenes never, never to return!
Scenes, if in stupor I forget,
  Again I feel, again I burn!
From ev’ry joy and pleasure torn,
  Life’s weary vale I’ll wander thro’;
And hopeless, comfortless, I’ll mourn
  A faithless woman’s broken vow.

1. I Gaed a Waefu' Gate Yestreen
2. Blythe Was She
3. Farewell to Ballochmyle
4. Stay My Charmer
5. On a Bank of Flowers

Joanna Baillie The Lament ("SWEET lake! while shades are closing round")

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