How Long and Dreary is the Night by Robert Burns
The speaker laments the long, dreary nights endured while separated from a beloved “dearie.” Though weary, the speaker cannot sleep from evening until morning, remembering the happy days once spent together and grieving over the lands that now divide them. The passing hours seem painfully slow and sorrowful, unlike the swift, bright time that passed when the speaker was with the beloved.
By Robert Burns · First published 1792 · Genre: Lyric Poetry, Love Poetry, Scottish Poetry · 183 words
First lines
How long and dreary is the night, / When I am frae my dearie! / I sleepless lie frae e'en to morn, / Tho' I were ne'er so weary: / I sleepless lie frae e'en to morn, / Tho' I were ne'er sae weary!
When I think on the happy days / I spent wi' you my dearie: / And now what lands between us lie, / How can I be but eerie! / And now what lands between us lie, / How can I be but eerie!
How slow ye move, ye heavy hours, / As ye were wae and weary! / It wasna sae ye glinted by, / When I was wi' my dearie! / It wasna sae ye glinted by, / When I was wi' my dearie!
What this Textopian page supports
How Long and Dreary is the Night is listed on Textopian as a poem by Robert Burns, dated 1792 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Poem
- Author: Robert Burns
- Date: 1792 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Lyric Poetry, Love Poetry, Scottish Poetry, Lament, Song
- Length: 183 words
- Structure: 1 section, 3 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Very Easy (5th Grade or below)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for How Long and Dreary is the Night by Robert Burns
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
- Readability and classroom-planning context
- Passage-specific claims should cite the exact /read/ URL for the relevant chapter or paragraph
Similar titles
- The Bonie Lad Thats Far Awa by Robert Burns
- The Winter It Is Past by Robert Burns
- Talk Of Him Thats Far Awa by Robert Burns
- Of A The Airts The Wind Can Blaw by Robert Burns
- Tho Cruel Fate Should Bid Us Part by Robert Burns
- The Young Highland Rover by Robert Burns
Genres
- Lyric Poetry — A short, song-like first-person poem expressing an intense private emotional state through repetition, musical phrasing, and compact stanzas.
- Love Poetry — The speaker mourns separation from a beloved 'dearie' and contrasts present loneliness with the happiness of their time together.
- Scottish Poetry — Burns employs Scots vocabulary and idiom, including 'frae,' 'wi',' 'sae,' 'wasna,' and 'eerie,' grounding the poem in Scottish literary and linguistic tradition.
- Lament — The poem voices grief, sleeplessness, loneliness, and the painfully slow passage of time caused by absence from the beloved.
Tags
Scottish poetry · Scots language · lyric poem · love lament · separation from a beloved · longing · sleeplessness · dreary night · nighttime solitude · absent lover · romantic yearning · melancholy