---
title: "The Banks o’ Doon"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Song"
year: "1791"
version: "Third"
location: "Ellisland"
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/the-banks-o-doon-third/"
---

# The Banks o’ Doon

## Song
Ye banks and braes o’ bonie Doon,  
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair?  
How can ye chant, ye little birds,  
And I sae weary fu’ o’ care!  
Thou’ll break my heart, thou warbling bird,  
That wantons thro’ the flowering thorn:  
Thou minds me o’ departed joys,  
Departed never to return.

Aft hae I rov’d by Bonie Doon,  
To see the rose and woodbine twine:  
And ilka bird sang o’ its Luve,  
And fondly sae did I o’ mine;  
Wi’ lightsome heart I pu’d a rose,  
Fu’ sweet upon its thorny tree!  
And may fause Luver staw my rose,  
But ah! he left the thorn wi’ me.

---

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/the-banks-o-doon-third/