Statue of Robert Burns
Statue of Robert Burns - meaning Summary
Admiration Across Distance
The poem records an Australian visitor standing before a statue of Robert Burns and feeling a sudden kinship with the Scottish poet. The speaker admires the sculpted likeness, reads sympathy and humour into the face, and connects Burns’s experience of hardship to his own. The monument triggers homesickness and gratitude, promising endurance and a future return to the banks of the Doon with renewed hope and friendship.
Read Complete AnalysesTo a town in Southern land Light of purse I come and lone; And I pause awhile, and stand By a pedestal of stone; And I bend my head and bow While my heart to Scotland turns, For I know I’m standing now ‘Neath the form of Robbie Burns. Round the corners of the lips Lines of laughter seem to run; From the merry eye there slips Just a twinkle as of fun. Living in the sculptor’s art, Set in stone, mine eye discerns All the beauty, and a part Of the soul, of Robert Burns. One of Caledonia’s sons, Coming lonely to the land. Well might think he’d met a friend Who would take him by the hand, And the tears spring to his eyes, While his heart for friendship yearns; And from out that heart he cries, Heaven bless ye, Bobbie Burns. Unto me, as unto you, Has a hard world done ill turns; And the sorrows that you knew I am learning Bobbie Burns. But I’ll keep my heart above Until, after many moons, I return to friends I love, And to banks line bonnie Doon’s.
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