Robert Burns (1759–1796). Poems and Songs.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
342 . SongSweet Afton
F
Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise;
My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den, Thou green-crested lapwing thy screaming forbear, I charge you, disturb not my slumbering Fair. Far mark’d with the courses of clear, winding rills; There daily I wander as noon rises high, My flocks and my Mary’s sweet cot in my eye. Where, wild in the woodlands, the primroses blow; There oft, as mild Ev’ning weeps over the lea, The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me. And winds by the cot where my Mary resides; How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave, As, gathering sweet flowerets, she stems thy clear wave. Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays; My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream, Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.