Welcome to Peccadillo's Water Story blog

Happy Burns day 2017, what better day to launch our Water Story blog.

To start us off as we mean to carry on, this contribution is from Pat Sutherland.

Rab, I wish you knew.

You were a man o' pairts, Rab,

a poet wi' pen, a sophist wi' plough,

stoppin' amang the stour

tae beg a moosie's pardon,

say sorry tae a daisy;

mockin' the unco' guid

then lickin' their boots

for patronage.

A  lusty man, Rab,

wi' charm an' sweetest words

ye won the lassies,

faitherin' bairns across the county,

keepin' warm the cutty stool

fur sake o' cutty sarks,

ge'in'  gleefu' gossip

tae warpit auld wives.

You loved them a', Rab,

the Jeans an Lizzies,

jist no wan at a time,

an' them that deid or left,

you loved forever.

Above a', Rab, a workin' man,

you filled each year

wi' toil;

tied tae a plough,

you laboured

in the futile fields

an wrote an wrote

by candle licht

seein' your best laid schemes

wasted, like sodden acres.

You deid too soon, Rab,

before the word went roon,

before  Rab the Rhymer

gie'd way tae 'Scotland's Bard'

before, across the globe

shackled nations sang

that man to man, the world o'er,

shall brithers be for a' that.

Today we toast you

and a' your works:

the sangs, the poems,

the lassies, the bairns -

the words that winna dee:

Here's freedom to them that would read.

Here's freedom to them that would write!

There's nane ever feare'd that the truth should be heard

But they wham the truth wid indite!

Oh Rab, I wish you knew.

by Pat Sutherland