---
title: "I Dream’d I Lay"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Song"
year: "1771 - 1779"
location: "Mount Oliphant"
source: "Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns"
source_url: "https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt"
canonical_url: "https://robert-burns.com/poems/i-dreamd-i-lay/"
---

# I Dream’d I Lay

## Song
I dream’d I lay where flowers were springing  
Gaily in the sunny beam;  
List’ning to the wild birds singing,  
By a falling crystal stream:  
Straight the sky grew black and daring;  
Thro’ the woods the whirlwinds rave;  
Tress with aged arms were warring,  
O’er the swelling drumlie wave.

Such was my life’s deceitful morning,  
Such the pleasures I enjoyed:  
But lang or noon, loud tempests storming  
A’ my flowery bliss destroy’d.  
Tho’ fickle fortune has deceiv’d me—  
She promis’d fair, and perform’d but ill,  
Of mony a joy and hope bereav’d me—  
I bear a heart shall support me still.

---

Source: [Project Gutenberg #1279 — Poems and Songs of Robert Burns](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1279/pg1279.txt)  
Canonical HTML: https://robert-burns.com/poems/i-dreamd-i-lay/