---
title: "The Henpecked Husband"
author: "Robert Burns"
form: "Poem"
year: "1788"
location: "Mossgiel"
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-henpecked-husband/"
---

# The Henpecked Husband

## Poem
Curs’d be the man, the poorest wretch in life,  
The crouching vassal to a tyrant wife!  
Who has no will but by her high permission,  
Who has not sixpence but in her possession;  
Who must to he, his dear friend’s secrets tell,  
Who dreads a curtain lecture worse than hell.  
Were such the wife had fallen to my part,  
I’d break her spirit or I’d break her heart;  
I’d charm her with the magic of a switch,  
I’d kiss her maids, and kick the perverse bitch.

---

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-henpecked-husband/