Scottish Country Dance of the Day

The countdown continues to Burns Night this Jan 25th! Planning a Burns Supper Dance?
Enjoy a Virtual Burns Night in Scottish Country Dance form and move through a traditional evening with vintage images and Scottish Country Dances for every aspect! Or augment your own Burns Night by choosing a dance from our Burns Night selections.
We've had the WELCOME dances, the HAGGIS dances, now let's move on to the poetical part of the evening - THE SONGS & POEMS dances!
"Bonie lassie, will ye go,
Will ye go, will ye go,
Bonie lassie, will ye go
To the birks of Aberfeldie!
Now simmer blinks on flowery braes,
And o'er the crystal streamlet plays;
Come, let us spend the lightsome days,
In the birks of Aberfeldie!"
~ Robert Burns, The Birks of Aberfeldie, 1787
Many of Robert Burns poems and songs have a Scottish Country Dance tribute! Continue your virtual evening with some poetry and verse of the dancing kind. Is your favorite represented? Can you add an obscure reference to the anthology? A Man's a Man for a' That, Ae Fond Kiss, Mary Morison and many more!
Shown: "Reading his poem the 'Winter Night' Before A Literary Gathering at the Duchess of Gordon's" in Edinburgh, 1787, after Charles Martin Hardie
A Winter Night
BY ROBERT BURNS
When biting Boreas, fell and doure,
Sharp shivers thro' the leafless bow'r;
When Phoebus gies a short-liv'd glow'r,
Far south the lift,
Dim-dark'ning thro' the flaky show'r,
Or whirling drift:
Ae night the storm the steeples rocked,
Poor Labour sweet in sleep was locked,
While burns, wi' snawy wreeths upchoked,
Wild-eddying swirl,
Or thro' the mining outlet bocked,
Down headlong hurl.
List'ning, the doors an' winnocks rattle,
I thought me on the ourie cattle,
Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle
O' winter war,
And thro' the drift, deep-lairing, sprattle,
Beneath a scar.
Ilk happing bird, wee, helpless thing!
That, in the merry months o' spring,
Delighted me to hear thee sing,
What comes o' thee?
Whare wilt thou cow'r thy chittering wing
An' close thy e'e?
Ev'n you on murd'ring errands toil'd,
Lone from your savage homes exil'd,
The blood-stain'd roost, and sheep-cote spoil'd
My heart forgets,
While pityless the tempest wild
Sore on you beats.
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