Post
by JWMcCalvin » February 13th, 2009, 8:49 pm
This is a response to a reply in Book Suggestions, which said, 'Come here to make further comments,' so I came here to make a further comment.
Ahem
THOSE LITTLE WORDS
(with apologies to modest lassies
and people with literary taste--
or any sort of taste)
Tune: make up your own
I hae ye ken those 'little words'
In Burn's Merry Muses
Which, spoken in a class or kirk
Dismays, perturbs, confuses
Are, in the copy one may find
In the Internet Archive,
Sae careful blanked or blinked or blotched
'Tis nearly good to shrive
So hae nae fear that ye may read--
Because in fact ye won't--
Unexpurgated versions of
A__e, c__k or f__k or or c__t!
Of course, what to do when they're read aloud is another matter! Incidentally, I did a search for 'old Scottish tunes,' thinking perhaps to find audios of some of the ones used for the verses in case anyone wanted to try singing, but airs like 'Clout the Cauldron,' 'The tailor fell thro the bed,' 'The Quaker's Wife,' 'Sir Alex Don's Straphspey' and 'Push About the Orum' don't seem to be that popular on the Net nowadays. I didn't search for any of them individually so I won't say they can't be found; and of course there might be Scottish Librivox members on whose lips any and all of these might linger frequently.