The Banks O' Doon (First Version)
written in 1791
The Banks O' Doon (First Version) - meaning Summary
Nature Frames Private Grief
Burns uses a bright riverside scene to register private sorrow. The speaker describes the banks of the Doon, birds, and flowers with affectionate detail, but these images continually trigger memories of a betrayed relationship. Past happiness is recalled in simple actions — sitting, singing, plucking a rose — then undercut by the lover’s treachery, leaving the speaker with shame and loss. The poem contrasts external cheerfulness with inner grief and shows how landscape and song can both console and reopen emotional wounds. The Scots diction keeps the voice immediate and personal.
Read Complete AnalysesSweet are the banks - the banks o' Doon, The spreading flowers are fair, And everything is blythe and glad, But I am fu' o' care. Thou'll break my heart, thou bonie bird, That sings upon the bough; Thou minds me o' the happy days When my fause Luve was true: Thou'll break my heart, thou bonie bird, That sings beside thy mate; For sae I sat, and sae I sang, And wist na o' my fate. Aft hae I rov'd by bonie Doon, To see the woodbine twine; And ilka birds sang o' its Luve, And sae did I o' mine: Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, Upon its thorny tree; But my fause Luver staw my rose And left the thorn wi' me: Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, Upon a morn in June; And sae I flourished on the morn, And sae was pu'd or noon!
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