Address to a Haggis: The Good News Version
How like a smiley-face you are!
Pre-eminent among all forms of prepared meat
(though chiefly made of guts),
you are worthy of a decent thanksgiving -
one of considerable length, too.
Almost too large for the plate, you resemble
a large backside, or a hill seen from a distance.
The small metal clip holding you together may prove useful
and should be salvaged at the end of the meal.
The cooking process has forced amber liquid through your skin
Yum!
Wiping the residue of previous work from his knife
he makes a swift cut down your middle -
opening you like a trench in the ground.
Everyone is happy with the wafting odour.
This is clearly a well-cooked Haggis!
Table manners are soon forgotten. With spoon in hand
each elbows ahead of the others. To hell with them!
Now, bloated and in pain, they loll about the table.
The head of the household, ready to fart,
intones a well-known thanksgiving psalm from the hymnal
to mask the noise.
Purveyors of Continental cuisine
look down on local country food like ours
but their oily stews and fancy concoctions
would make a sow-pig
pucker up her face and puke!
Look at those poor buggers
forced to eat crap like that!
They’re as week as weeds
with spindly legs and little fists
ill-suited to wading through a battle field
The rural Scot who eats haggis regularly
has a heavy footfall and a strong hand.
He is good with a knife
and well capable of dismembering and beheading
his opponents.
Oh you residual pagan gods and forest spirits
who control the fates of ordinary people.
True Scots want no watery soup
in little wooden dishes.
If you want us to be truly grateful
cook us up a haggis!
Address to a Haggis:
The Authorized Version
The Authorized Version
Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o' the puddin-race!
Aboon them a' ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang's my arm.
The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hudies like a distant hill,
Your pin wad help to mend a mill
In time o' need,
While thro' your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead.
His knife see rustic Labour dight,
An' cut ye up wi' ready slight,
Trenching your gushing entrails bright,
Like onie ditch;
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reeking, rich!
Then horn for horn, they stretch an' strive:
Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive,
Till a' their weel-swall'd kytes belyve
Are bent like drums;
Then auld Guidman, maist like to rive,
'Bethankit!' hums.
Is there that owre his French ragout,
Or olio that wad staw a sow,
Or fricassee wad mak her spew
Wi perfect scunner,
Looks down wi' sneering, scornfu' view
On sic a dinner?
Poor devil! see him owre his trash,
As feckless as a wither'd rash,
His spindle shank a guid whip-lash,
His nieve a nit;
Tho' bluidy flood or field to dash,
O how unfit.
But mark the Rustic, haggis-fed,
The trembling earth resounds his tread,
Clap in his walie nieve a blade,
He'll make it whistle;
An' legs, an' arms, an' heads will sned
Like taps o' thrissle.
Ye pow'rs, wha mak mankind your care,
And dish them out their bill o' fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware,
That jaups in luggies;
But if ye wish her gratfu' prayer,
Gie her a Haggis!
