Yet geology as a science was brand new at the time Burns was writing this is a very modern poem. The lines about all the seas going dry, and rocks melting with the sun, suggest to me that Burns must have had a grasp of what we now call ‘deep time’, of an almost infinite length of time through which his love, and the world, would last. My second reaction to the poem is rooted in my geological training. So when I read the poem I don’t see the big blowsy blossoms of today’s suburban gardens I see tightly-folded red velvet lips in an Ayrshire hedgerow. I’m satisfied in my own mind that Burns was writing about the vivid red buds of the dog rose, ‘newly sprung in June’. And then I recalled that when they are in bud, the flowers are red. Many of today’s red rose cultivars are derived from Chinese rose species,but these original introductions were in 1798 at the earliest, and Burns’ 1794 song predates that.Which native rose would an 18th-century west coast ploughman see all around him? Rosa canina, the dog rose, is the obvious answer. A fascinating question which set off some extremely interesting research. “Which species of rose was Burns writing about in the poem?” he asked me. When I was Librarian of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, I had a letter from a designer tasked with producing a set of commemorative Burns stamps.

This poem, especially in its song form, is very well known, but like some other good songs, there are underlying subtleties which can be missed in the malty spicy fumes of a Burns Supper. Introduced by a variety of writers, artists and other guests, the Scottish Poetry Library’s classic poem selections are a reminder of wonderful poems to rediscover.

A red red rose song