The Mouse
You could have guessed that Burns wasn't addressing his poem "to a mouse" just for the heck of it—the mouse probably has some kind of symbolic meaning. But what's this little rodent doing, exactl...
The Plough
Ah, the plough (American spelling is "plow," in case you were confused). What's a mouse to do? You build a nest, insulate it and stock up against the coming winter, and then a plough comes and mows...
The Winter
The winter is coming quickly, and the mouse has been turned out of his nest. Poor little guy might either freeze or starve. As the poem progresses, the speaker reflects that the plight of the mouse...