"One of the great powers of music is that it can mean nothing and anything, sometimes at once" (John Luther Adams).

*

from the Scottish ballad Poor Mary Lee

Oh! once I lived happily by yon bonny burn--
The world was in love with me;
But now I must sit neath the cold drift and mourn,
And curse black Robin-a-Ree.

Then whudder away thou bitter biting blast
And sough through the scrunty tree,
And smoor me up in the snow full fast,
And ne'er let the sun me see!

Oh, ne'er melt away, thou wreath of snow,
That's so kind in graving me;
But hide me from the scorn and guffaw
Of villains like Robin-a-Ree.

Charlotte Bronte quotes these verses in her novel Shirley, though she uses Scots dialect spellings, which I've dropped here because I find them annoying. According to the notes, "this ballad appears under the title 'Robin-a-Ree' in John Mactaggart's Scottish Gallovidian Encyclopedia (1824)," but Bronte's rendition is "from a shortened and 'smoother' [1843] version."

Interestingly, the ballad is not easy to find in a quick Google search; only the Bronte passage appears, and I'm curious about the accuracy of her transcription. For instance, the first line of the second stanza contains two extra syllables: this makes for awkward poetry, but it could be perfectly suited for the melodic variations of a tune. I wonder what it would sound like sung. Even on the page, the strange verbal forms are lovely and precise evocations of weather: whudder, sough, smoor. I think they would be eloquent in the air.

Also, I know exactly what a scrunty tree looks like. Given Maine's weather forecast (yet another blizzard on Sunday), you may need to hunt for me "neath the cold drift" beside the scrunty tree. I'll be smoored up there.