Analysis of The Rymor and I...

The Rymor and I
1.Thomas the Rymor
2.I

A contemporary extemporization

1
When Rymor who frae Erseldown
Espied a pultring maid                                            (Pultring – rutting, lascivious. Pultrous – lustful)
‘Twas love sweet love led him along
A traipsing in a glade

Tae know some new thing perhaps
Keen Thomas strove below
But love oh love led him along
Once more tae earthly show

For there in lands of mimicry
True Thomas swane not elderly                             (Swane – young)
Where there did he of Erseldown
Enquire by Eldon tree

Had Thomas known what bode beneath
This towering spire above
A roving he might nae ha’e gone
So spritely for a love

What saw he there few souls can tell
A poem suffice tae say
Farewell one love so for another
The pride of seelie sidh                                           (Seelie sidh – good fairies)

His homeland here thought sore missed he
Of heather and the heath
Some airy sprite watched o’er the toun
Where Rymor sank beneath

Tho’ there be more no doubt hid
By dint of those queer folk in
Fay land should gift betoken
Truer the word was e’er spoken

Unseelie sidh save ee’ tae see                                  (Unseelie sidh – bad fairies)
What roves there too near the Eldon tree
Where Robert Kirk and Rymor be
And soon perhaps a witeless me

Yon Rymor stone and Huntly burn
Wi’ crooked stream and perilous urn
Stand by the Tweed ae surly
‘Neath jagged crags o’er perilous pourie

Once stood by Eldon tree uprooted
An entrance now mere lore
Of sovereign sent by which he went
Toils  ne’rmore

Where Tweed’s burns tumble far and wide
          Frae Lanark o’er tae Lauder
And lark crow flies the Eldons pry
          Along its bridled border

And thru’ each night
When spires they sleep anon
The ferlies buzz their toil tae day
And keep their watch tae dawn

Thus here the tale of which is told
Of heaven above and hell unfold
          I leave it now and up tae thee
Tae marvel of it naturally

First here a cliché tae clear this up
I sip now of communion cup
And pray the Lord my soul tae keep
Should I pass o’er in my sleep
2
When fair drank I the bubbly shade
Not once tae meet a tripping maid
Instead saw I cold and unafraid
A troll sat ominously in the glade

My faithful friend submissive she
Sped back a tad affrightedly
And on that day we wisely knew
Tae go not through where hell hunds do

Of things true which I ha’e seen
‘Twas ne’er quite the ferlie queen
The face which did at first appear
Kirk’s troublesome haunting bode oh so clear

Beneath an upturned bowl-shaped hat a head
What doting thing is this that nature thou
Such malady can procreate
And hallowed wings allow

A beating heart therein no more
That bears out tae the wilderness
Tae build itself a house thereof
Of abject wickedness

Tae suffer Kirk’s fate when he did mill
Upon a charmed ferlie hill
Was not my wish that dingle day                                       (Dingle – silly)
When ferlie kids came out tae play

A sentinel or something best unspoken
What so it be ‘twas not for me
Unlike Kirk who drees his weird                                        (Drees his weird – endures his fate)
Still yet beneath the ferlie scree

What once a man mid earth’s domain
Now cursed be a sad refrain
A tarnished soul no doubt tae say
Was once profane humanity

Grim in its grimmest form
The geniie wings the storm
Slight as some cloud said Shelly
That catches but the palest tinge of day

A home for itself tae make
In Shinar tae the East
Drift and blow o’er all the earth
Tae sate unholy beast

Tae feed its ain atrophied clan
It milks the wickedness of man
Accursed the magic car it be
Was Shelley’s ode that means tae me

The hag sped o'er the windy muir
A mile I'd say no more or fewer
Tae meet wi' mother sure I think
It moved a mile there in a blink

A mile I knew for it did turn
At Lee Pen's tip o'er icy burn
And then wi’ speed uncanny flew
Once not tae disbelieve it true

There in a box where was my name
Did not occur tae me as sane
But in it there inked my bode tae
And someone took it fleece away

Tae thieve the box I thought low
Which soon thereafter I did know
That something other had occurred
Before the move tae Ladyurd

A craft o'er me flew by the eve
When first I saw baith hags on leave
Lee Pen was where I stood below
The moon lit low wi' rosy glow

A man flew on that craft I found
The next day he was on the ground
What time, he asked, was that say clear
Same time I saw his craft appear

The pilot said there was delay
Conflicting lights there high that day
And there I was, full witness tae
Twa sentries of auld Nick's array
Scotia’s bard knew it well
What skim the muirs are spat frae hell
          And renew their leagues in kirkyards
          O’er howcket dead as Burns had rightly said                   (Howcket – dug up)

Of Michael Scott bard Burns did know
        Thus inked in verse what doth below
        Become of frail humanity                                                  (Verse 9 Address to the devil)
          When cursed fleas steal blasphemy           

Now scholar Scott of his demise
          Wise of hell’s dour eldritch spies
          Took tae rest the cross of Christ
          Tae guard his grave frae hellish tryst

And a book of spells hilarity
          The Bible was what took with he
          Tae stay the fiends is no haver
          For Scott knew something true and graver

Thought Michael Scott by one side
          Divined the Eldon woe betide
        A wizard not was he
          But a scholar of philosophy

Of Scott said able divided three
          The hill by Eldon tree
          ‘Twas fable mere and simply put
          Tae clove the Eldon hill a hoot

Tho’ Scott ne’er cast a single spell
          Yet Dante plunged him deep in hell
          In the eight circle of pain
          For e’er there tae remain

The truth be told of what Burns said
          A plunder was the horror’s head
          White, grizzled, black and grey
          The wisp of hill and speedy brae

Now this account of no pretense
Might seem as if tae make no sense
But then a voice I sudden knew
Just as twa steeds spun up in view

Harked, ‘Get thee hence’ and off they sped
One garment grey, the other red
Tae flit o’er earth’s high vault bright
And build a home in broad daylight

Tho’ ‘Woe is me’ our Rymor be
But woe am I as well
For I ha’e spied what few ha’e spied
And ken there is a hell

There in the trees black phantoms bode
By a track my ain dear strode
But dear God’s love abides tae there
Wherein doth lie the evil stare

Another seer suffice tae say
Along Kirk’s line and Rymor’s way
Both Kirk and I tae ferlie curse
         ‘Thou hast proclaimed our power, be thou now our prey’

What crime so foul a bode be rent
By the ruin of an owrie babble                                              (Owrie – superstitious)
The ferlie curse declared of us
Was fairer on its rabble

A family gone, a wife, a son
A testament tae ire
Which could ha’e been a threnody                                        (Threnody – a dirge)
When once in dream I saw a raging fire

Then soon happed that calamity
A drink, the flame, the cursed frame
Of something best unseen
No delusive fancy I saw mere in dream

And in the midst of roaring flame
Of which I am tae blame
I looked on high a time tae die
The flames did not touch me

As revelry mess is not my thing
          I swept the briar for the spring
Then under waning sun was stung
Misfortune for a good deed done

Suspected there that wily spy
Was prying frae the broken glade
And as I cleared the rotten core
Hell came knocking at my door

First ragweed nags of dizzy crags
Then Shelley’s magic car that eve’
Which ‘twas like new machinery
That rode on by quite silently

Then there beneath prints deep in snow
Affrighted that we did not slow
But hurried onward home did we
Tae leave behind a dead ferlie

A hum of bees times thousand ten
There when the bower burned blue
The host of azure earth appeared
Tae fetch his surly due

And twa fine minds there by whom live
Solved the riddle wrong
A fa’an satellite ‘twas said they
That floated by along

By that shorn way my hund and I
Did pass there by the ferlie lie
And as we did a ferlie light
On the ground cast shadow bright

Above my bode a rendezvous
I timed it at twelve thirty two
Not once but twice did one pass through
Tae vanish there frae starlit view

Just as before my maid there saw
What was a beast of sorts
A bird or no; what so it be
‘Twas deltoid frae A tae C

Was where spied I the deltoid dog
Another kind I met one eve
No owner there I saw at least
By that dwelling of the beast

The jet black hund on back road dark
By me strode melancholy
Tae find it flat upon that track
Was what I thought when I got back

Fixed steeds went thru’ of that I’m sure
Saw I those lights bright and impure
The hund was gone and there a steer
It took the shape of an ogling deer

And black hund oft’ thought Azrael
Meant psychopomp for me                                             (Psychopomp – keeper of souls)
That fine one day contrite I prayed
The return of my family

A speeding steed a sad affair
Where killed a cat was there
All white be it as it had been
There now delights the ferlie queen

By haugh and wa’ where once it sat
No more tae chase the beady rat
Now it chases ferlie sprites
The summer long and winter night

Where in that forest be decay
Three ferlies cold came by the way
In single file not tae beguile
I spied a furtive smile

All garbed akin the ferlies three
Were ‘weird’ my braw lad said tae me
And hastened onward home did we
Thereby no more tae be

Then man in whit