Preamble: As Burns said in his “Epistle to Jamie Smith”.
“ Just now I’ve taen a fit o’ rhyme
My barmie noodle’s working prime
My fancy jerkit up sublime
Wi’ hasty summon
Hae ye a leisure-moment’s time
To hear what’s comin’.”

To The Bard it was Posey, and oft did he write,
About the morn and the day and monie a ‘night’.
He wrote about that and he wrote about this
He covered them a’, not one did he miss.
The present, the future and even the past.
Towards the end he created , ‘O, Wert thou in the Cauld Blast’.
He wrote about life and he wrote about death,
His ill-begotten daughter- his own beloved Beth.

Epitaphs, Elegies, Epigrams an’ Epistles
Prayers, Graces, Prologues and even ‘The Whistle’.
He wrote about Liberty, Freedom and Honesty,
Marriage, Remorse, Vision and Poverty.
He wrote of the Flowers, like ‘A Red Red Rose’
‘ Fine Flowers in the Valley’ an’ then ‘The Primrose’
He addressed the ‘ Haggis, the ‘ Toothache’ and the ‘Deil’
The’ Unco Guid’, ‘ Beezlebub’, then wrote ‘Bannocks o’ Bear Meal’.

The Lasses and Lads all got share o’ his pen,
As he created songs to his loves, his friends, an’- then
He wrote of ‘Miss Davies’, ‘Jean Scott’, and ‘Handsome Nell’,
‘ Pretty Peg’, ‘Highland Mary’, and ‘Bonie Bell’.
There was Peggy and Polly, and Jenny and Jean.
And Margaret and Agnes, Mary and Jane.
There was William Creech, Smellie and a Chapman Billie,
The ‘Ronalds o; the Bennels’ and then’ Holy Willie’.

The creatures in his life they got mention, - ‘A Mouse’
‘ The Twa Dogs’, ‘The Twa Herds’ and even – ‘A Louse’.
‘ The Bonie Moor Hen’, ‘The Menagerie’ and ‘ A Wounded Hare’,
‘ The Rantin Dog’, ‘A Lap Dog’, and ‘Willie Nichol’s Mare’..
The classics- ‘Cotters Saturday Night’ and ‘Scots Wha Hae’
‘ A Highland Welcome’, ‘Highland Laddie’ And ‘Upon the Banks of Lomond, I lay I lay’,.
‘ The Holy Fair’, ‘Willie Wastle’, ‘Ye Flowery Banks’,
And in conclusion- ‘Fairest Maid on Devon Banks’.

Many more poems, songs and verse did he pen
Besides letters, ‘Merry Muses’, and – then,
Of these did he write and a whole lot mair,
As he went from this life, and parting is sair.
Off did he go, but his works are alive
Much better known today, and all did survive.
From the Pen of An Ayrshire Bard, A Scottish Bard,
And now, far and near, a Worldly Bard.

Frank Campbell 2003