Twa lowes on the loan

TWA LOWES ON THE LOAN
A Courtship Song in Literary Scots
Daniil Lazko
The text of the poem, with a Scots–English glossary,
a literary analysis, and a note on Robert Burns and the courtship song
Tuapse · 25 September 2026
;
TWA LOWES ON THE LOAN
Daniil Lazko

I
The fiddle skirled its hinmaist reel,
The barn door gantit on the nicht,
An Kirsty birled upon her heel
Intae the ebbin o the licht;
It fand her hair an held it there,
Like copper in the smiddy’s glare.

II
“An whaur’s your road the nicht?” she speired.
“The same as yours,” says I, fu croose;
An weel she kent (an sae I feared)
It ran clean contrar tae my hoose.
She lauched, an pit the lantren’s bool
Intae my nieve: “Then lead, ye fool.”

III
We took the loan atween the stooks,
The hairst-mune risin ower the Law,
When Mistress Fyfe, wi sidelang looks,
Cried ower her dyke: “Tak tent, you twa!
Haud aff my stackyaird, gin ye please —
Twa lunts like you wad fire the leas!”

IV
“Nae fear,” quo Kirsty, “this ane’s green:
He’ll reek a while, but winna lowe.”
I stertit: “Kirsty, thae twa een —“
An gaed my length doon ower the knowe.
She nichered till she had tae sit:
“Ach, Copper-pow — ye’re no oot yet.”

V
She gied her haun tae heeze me oot,
An held it, mebbe, a breath ower lang;
Syne drappit it, as gin in doot,
An hummed the fiddler’s hinmaist sang.
The dew lay cauld on gress an stane;
My loof was warm — an no my ain.

VI
“Noo name the tune.” I couldna tell:
For a’ I’d heard o bow or fiddle,
My een had follaed her hersel
Frae door tae door an doon the middle.
“I ken,” says she. “An hoo,” says I,
“Gin ye’d nae ee on me forbye?”

VII
Nae answer cam; but doon there slid
Her shawl; an whan I set it richt
Her shouther dirled (or else mine did),
An the lantren shoogled a’ its licht.
Her breath cam short; the air was saft;
A whaup cried somewhaur ower the craft.

VIII
Ower sune we won tae her faither’s yett;
She laid her fingers on the sneck,
Syne cried, “My ribbon!” — as gin she’d let
It slip unkent frae roon her neck.
“Ye’ll help me seek it?” “Aye, by your leave.”
(I’d seen the tail o’t up her sleeve.)

IX
Sae back we gaed the wey we’d come;
Whase haun socht whase, I canna sweir,
But hauns were fund, an baith gaed dumb,
An socht for ribbons far an near.
She stoppit at the stile; an there
The lantren fand ae lowe o hair.

X
Back at the yett, a’ mim an douce,
She drew it frae her sleeve: “Losh, see!”
An knotted it, an no ower loose,
Aboot my wrist: “Ye’ll bring it me.”
She took the licht, an I my lane
Gaed hame by nicht, an needit nane.

Tuapse, 25 September 2026
;
Glossary of Scots Words
Words are given in the spelling used in the poem. Where a form is inflected, the base form follows in brackets. Everyday reduced forms of English words (an, o, wi, tae, frae, ower, doon, oot) are included for completeness.
Scots English
a' all
aboot about
ae one, a single
aff off
ain own
an and
atween between
baith both
birl (birled) to spin, whirl
bool curved carrying-handle of a lantern or pail
cam came
cauld cold
clean completely, entirely
contrar contrary, the opposite way
Copper-pow “copper-head”: teasing nickname for a red-haired lad
couldna could not
craft croft, small farm
croose cocky, confidently bold
dirl (dirled) to tremble, thrill, vibrate
doon down
doot doubt
douce sedate, demure, respectable
drap (drappit) to drop
dumb silent, wordless
dyke dry-stone wall
ebbin ebbing, fading
ee, een eye, eyes
fand found
follae (follaed) to follow
forbye as well, besides
frae from
fu full; very, quite
fund found (past participle)
gae (gaed) to go (went)
gae my length to fall flat, measure one’s length on the ground
gant (gantit) to yawn, gape
gied gave
gin if; as gin, as if
gress grass
hairst harvest; hairst-mune, harvest moon
hame home
haud aff keep off, stay away from
haun, hauns hand, hands
heeze to hoist, haul up
hersel herself
hinmaist last, hindmost
hoo how
hoose house
intae into
ken (kent) to know
knowe knoll, hillock
lantren lantern
lauch (lauched) to laugh
Law rounded hill (common in place-names)
lea, leas grassland, field
licht light
loan country lane, track between fields
loof palm of the hand
Losh! mild exclamation of surprise (euphemism for “Lord”)
lowe flame, blaze, glow
lunt lit match, torch, slow-match
mebbe maybe
mim prim, affectedly demure
my lane alone, by myself
nae no
nane none
needit needed
nicher (nichered) to snigger, giggle
nicht night
nieve fist, closed hand
noo now
o, o't of, of it
oot out
ower over; too (ower sune, too soon)
pit put
quo said, quoth
rax (raxed) to reach, stretch
reek to smoke
richt right
roon round
sae so
saft soft
sang song
shoogle (shoogled) to shake, wobble
shouther shoulder
sidelang sidelong
skirl (skirled) to sound shrilly
smiddy smithy, forge
sneck latch of a door or gate
socht sought
somewhaur somewhere
speir (speired) to ask
stackyaird stackyard, where corn-stacks stand
stane stone
stert (stertit) to start, begin
stook shock of sheaves set up in a harvest field
stoppit stopped
stile steps over a field wall or fence
sune soon
sweir to swear
syne then, next
tae to; too
tak tent take care, beware
thae those
twa two
unkent unknown, unnoticed
wad would
wey way
whase whose
whaup curlew
whaur where
wi with
win (won) to get to, reach
winna will not
yett gate
;
Literary Analysis
Form and music
Twa Lowes on the Loan is written in ten six-line stanzas rhymed ABABCC, a sixain that pairs an alternately rhymed quatrain with a closing couplet. The quatrain carries the movement of the walk and the exchange of words; the couplet lands each stanza like the end of a musical phrase, often with a punchline, a gesture, or an image. The line is a four-beat song measure, mostly iambic tetrameter, loosened in places by anapaestic substitutions (An the lantren shoogled a' its licht) of the kind that singers absorb naturally. The poem deliberately avoids the Standard Habbie stanza (aaabab) most closely associated with Burns, so that its kinship with him lies in voice and sensibility rather than in borrowed form.
Structure: courtship as a sequence of actions
The poem tells its love story almost entirely through deeds. The fiddle stops, the barn door opens, and Kirsty steps into the last light. A white lie about the road home, a lantern handed over, a neighbour’s shout, a fall into the grass, a hand offered and held a breath too long, a test about a tune, a slipping shawl, a pretended lost ribbon, a return walk, a halt at the stile, a ribbon knotted round a wrist: each stanza adds one small act, and each act moves the pair a step closer. The emotional arc prescribed for the poem, from play through uncertainty to mutual recognition, is never stated; it is performed.
The motif of lowe
 The central image system is built on the Scots word lowe, a flame or glow. The last evening light makes Kirsty’s hair shine like copper in a smithy. Mistress Fyfe calls the two red-heads lunts who could set the harvest fields ablaze. Kirsty answers that the lad is green wood: he will smoke, but he will not catch fire. That teasing verdict becomes the hinge of the poem, because in the ninth stanza, at the stile, the lantern finds ae lowe o hair: one flame where there had been two heads. The kiss is never named; the reader sees it as a single blaze of red hair in the lantern light. In the last stanza Kirsty takes the lantern back, and the lad walks home in the dark and needit nane. The light she gave him at the start is withdrawn, and he no longer requires it.
Two equal lovers
 Kirsty directs the courtship from first to last. She sees through his lie and turns it into a game by handing him the lantern; she deflates the neighbour’s joke at his expense; she sets the test about the tune; she invents the lost ribbon, hides it in her own sleeve, and finally ties it to his wrist with an instruction, Ye'll bring it me, that secures a future meeting. The lad is warm, quick, and fallible. His one attempt at a gallant compliment ends with him flat on the ground; his one successful piece of wit, the question of how she could know where his eyes were unless hers were on him too, is the moment at which the attraction is shown to be mutual. Neither is idealised, and each is given the intelligence to read the other.
Humour and desire
 The humour never interrupts the romance; it is the medium through which the romance advances. The lie about the road, the green-wood jibe, the tumble, the sham search for a ribbon both lovers know is safe in a sleeve: all are jokes that also serve as signals. Sensuality is carried by the body in small, exact details: a hand held too long, a palm still warm with another’s warmth (My loof was warm — an no my ain), a shoulder that trembles, or a lantern that trembles because the hand holding it does, breath coming short. Nothing is explicit, and the restraint concentrates the charge.
Language
The poem is written in a consistent literary Scots with a light Central and North-East colouring. Spelling follows a single system (oo for the /u/ vowel in doon, oot, hoose, aboot, roon), apostrophes are kept to the minimum, and vocabulary is drawn from the working life of a farming community: stooks, stackyard, smiddy, dyke, sneck, yett, craft. Syntax and idiom are Scots as well as vocabulary: gaed my length, tak tent, as gin, my lane, ower sune we won. The aim is a register a singer could use without strain, neither antiquarian nor anglicised.
Robert Burns and the Courtship Song
Robert Burns (1759–1796) is remembered above all as a poet, but a large part of his creative life was given to song. From 1787 until his death he supplied, collected, restored, and rewrote hundreds of Scottish songs for James Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum and later for George Thomson’s A Select Collection of Original Scottish Airs. Much of this work was love song, and a great deal of it was courtship song: the meeting, the teasing, the walk home, the doubtful suitor and the self-possessed lass, set among the fields, burns, and farm-towns of rural Ayrshire and Dumfriesshire.
Burns himself traced the beginning of both his love and his poetry to the harvest field. In his first Commonplace Book he recalled that his first song was written in his fifteenth year for the girl who worked beside him at the harvest; he later described that season of shared labour as the time when rhyme and courtship first came together for him. The harvest, the dance, and the road home recur throughout his songs as the natural occasions of rural love, because they were the moments when young men and women of a working community met outside the watch of kirk and household.
Several features of Burns’s courtship songs inform the present poem at the level of tradition rather than text. His women frequently speak for themselves and are often wittier than their suitors; many of his songs are written in a woman’s voice, and their desire is presented as her own rather than as an object of male pursuit. His humour is affectionate rather than satirical when love is its subject. His sensuality is frank but seldom graphic, carried by the body’s ordinary signals and by the landscape around it. And he wrote for the voice: his lines are made to be sung, with stress falling where speech places it.
Twa Lowes on the Loan borrows none of Burns’s lines, refrains, characters, or stanza patterns. Its relation to him is one of inheritance: a local encounter treated with vernacular authority, an equal and witty heroine, desire expressed through gesture and jest, and a language that is Scots in its grammar and music, not merely in its word-list.
The Meaning of the Poem
The poem asks when playful courtship becomes genuine love, and how a person comes to know that desire is shared. Its answer is that the change cannot be pinned to a declaration, because it happens in the space between words. The lad cannot say whose hand reached first; the lovers fall silent at the very point where they would be expected to speak; the kiss is shown only as a single flame of hair in a lantern’s light.
The red hair that the two share is at first a public joke, a neighbour’s warning about two torches loose among the stacks. By the end it has become a private sign: two flames have become one. The poem thus moves from the comic and communal to the intimate without leaving the village road.
 The closing image carries the poem’s meaning. Kirsty takes back the lantern and leaves the lad to walk home alone in the dark, and he needs no light. The ribbon knotted on his wrist, with its instruction to bring it back, turns the evening’s game into a promise. Nothing is concluded, and everything has begun.
Technical Note
Genre courtship song / light love song in literary Scots
Primary theme love and desire: courtship, mutual flirtation, awakening desire
Secondary theme folk song and music; warm humour; rural locality
Form ten six-line song stanzas, 60 lines
Metre four-beat song measure, predominantly iambic tetrameter, with stress-based variation
Rhyme scheme ABABCC throughout
Scots register consistent literary Scots, Central and North-East colouring, minimal apostrophes
Traditional basis no documented event; a generalised lowland harvest-season setting within the tradition of the Scots courtship song

Daniil Lazko
Tuapse, 25 September 2026