Auld Class Photo
T Mackie Kerr

First published in the Stewarton School Diamond Jubilee Booklet,

republished in the 1968 Bonnet Guild Festival Guide.
 

Puir ill-used photo in my haun

 You tak me back tae years bygone;

You mak' me think and muse upon,

Time's changing power;

Alas for no man he will staun',

Not e'en an hour.
 

That's me there in the hindmaist raw,

As stiff's a stookie like to fa

A pit-can smile across my jaw,

For me it's rare,

I've on a shirt as white as snaw,

E'en brushed my hair.

That's Gillies, glowerin' on my right,

The Bonaparte of every fight;

His cantrips sent the teachers gyte,

And "since the tawse,

On his hard haun' each day did smite,

Our chief he was.

That laddie in the second raw,

A lad mair gleg you never saw,

Aye at the countin' and fitba',

His name was first;

His face here keeks oot ower us a',

Determined, pursed.

Upon the third line here displayed,

What change a few brief years have made;

One girl in her green grave is laid,

Ere she can learn,

How bitter is the world ahead,

How hard and stern.

Alang a bit I see a few,

Wha are a' married women noo,

But, though .it's strange, there's naething new,

Their ma's before,

Had photos ta'en in front of, too,

That same school door.

What thoughts this photo brings to me!—

Sometimes a memory filled wi' glee;

Sometimes a tear that dims the e'e,

Or vision soft.
The coming race in reverie

I conjure oft.
                                                                          T. MACKIE KERR.