Holy Gordon’s Prayer

About this poem

This poem was written as part of the Scottish Poetry Library's Addressing the Bard project in 2009. Twelve contemporary poets were asked to select a poem by Robert Burns and respond to it. Rab Wilson chose 'Holy willie's Prayer'. 

Rab Wilson comments:

When ah wis approached bi the Scottish Poetry Library tae play a pairt in their ongauns tae re-write/re-imagine ane o Burns’s greatest warks (we wir gien a leet o the poems we culd chuise frae, ah said ah wid be happy tae tackle white’er wis left eftir the ither makars hud made their walin! Hence ah wis the yin left wi ‘Holy Willie’s Prayer’!). It wis wi some sense o trepidation that ah approacht this michtiest an maist famous o the Bard’s satires.

Ah think it’s kindae deeficult fir fowks leevin in this secular age tae get their heids roond the importance that releegion played in society, an the pouer it still exertit, at the time o Burns. Gin he’d wrote this piece a hunner year earlier there’s nae dout he wid hae bin hung fir sic blasphemy. Perhaps, in a wey, ‘Holy Willie’ is an exaumpil o hou faur tolerance an common sense hud advanced in Scotland throu the teachins o the Enlichtenment?

Fir masel, ah am an atheist, sae tacklin this wark hud addit problems! But ah am alsae siccar in masel in screivin Scots an, lik Burns hissel, ah’m no averse tae ‘writin fir fun’, an ah enjoy writin topical poleetical satire nou an agane. Sae, in a wey, this ploy wis ‘Caviar to the General’!

‘Holy Willie’, William Fisher (1737-1809), wis a native o Mauchline, an kirk elder, wha invoked Burns’s ire, an satirical wrath, fir steerin up a releegious ‘<em>coort-case</em>’ anent Burns’s guid frien Gavin Hamilton. In Janwar 1785 the ‘<em>Moderate</em>’ Presbytery o Ayr ordert the erasure o the Mauchline kirk session meenits anent Hamilton; the case went tae appeal, but Hamilton won an wis gien a certificate lowsin him frae ony ecclesiastical censure. Ye can imagine the anger an indignation o Willie Fisher at these ongauns, an thus the imagined prayer that the self-richteous Willie declaims tae heivin.

‘Holy Willie’s Prayer’ wis written they reck directly eftir anither o ane o Burns’s great releegious satires, ‘The Holy Tulzie’, sae Burns wid hae bin oan a bit o a roll writin stuff that involved the direct uise o biblical references. Burns wid hae bin brocht up wi a deep knowledge o the Bible an it wid hae bin saicent nature fir him tae quote frae it when’er the need arose. Gin ony o the readers o this want tae fuin oot mair anent Burns’s poem, or the events surroundin its creatioun, then ah strangly encourage thaim tae read James Mckay’s influential <em>Burns; a Biography</em> of Robert Burns, and alsae tae consult the magisterial three volume edeetion <em>The Poems and Songs</em> of Robert Burns bi James Kinsley – ye wull not be disapyntit!

But tae oor tale! Wha did ah chuise fir ma modren ‘Holy Willie’? weel, unfortunately Tony Blair is nou history, an onywey, ah’d bin bate tae him bi Tony Harrison wha hus aareadies writ ‘Holy Tony’s Prayer’ – albeit he anely gied Blair a drubbin in rhyming doggerel couplets, while the subject o ma tirade gets the full ‘Staundart Habbie’ (Burns’s regular poetic metre) treatment! Ma subject hud tae be thon kenspeckle Scotsman, hailin frae Kirkcaldy, skeelie politeecian, son o the manse, an oor current Prime Meenister, Gordon Brown.

As wi Burns’s version ah hae consultit the Bible tae try an ensure that ‘Holy Gordon’ is gien aa due respect anent its poetic pedigree. Readers may consult the ‘guid buik’ at their leesure tae fuin an conseider the exact quotations applied an cited. At the end o the day this lichtweicht squib o mine cams naewhaurs near the genius o Burns’s satire – sic ploys as this wull generally ah’m thinkin produce anely technically correct, tho aiblins heirtfelt, tributes tae the man. Gin it maks ye lauch, think or smile tho, it wull hae achieved somethin.