"O my Luve is like a red, red rose" is of the most famous poetic similes of all time and has survived into our modern American culture—hundreds of years later. The effect of this simile is positive. The speaker is actually addressing these lines to his "bonnie lass" and professes his undying love to her. Red roses are often symbolic of true love and romantic desire. The speaker compares his love to roses which have bloomed in June, which is a time of new beginnings. This simile therefore portrays the speaker's love as both true and "newly sprung," yet he swears that it is a true love.
The speaker goes on to compare his love to a melody that is "sweetly played in tune." A melody is a series of notes which, when played together, create a pleasing sound. This is often the focal point of a harmonized musical selection....
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This simile furthers the claim of the speaker's adoration for his "bonnie lass." It takes some talent to play a beautiful melody, and the speaker professes that his love is just as beautiful. His love is pleasing, worth listening to, and sweet.
These similes establish a tone of adoration from the very first lines; the speaker continues to build upon these professions of a true and beautiful love until the last lines, when he vows that he will love his "bonnie lass" until the end of time.
Why does Burns compare his love to a rose?
The speaker of the poem compares his love to a rose, perhaps, because a rose is a beautiful natural object with its own symbolism and which is frequently associated with the seasons of spring and summer. A rose is a flower that is often connected with romance, and red is a color typically associated with love or passion. Thus, the author’s choice of flower species and color makes sense, symbolically.
In addition to these common connections between roses, the color red, and love or passion, flowers are associated with the warm, growing seasons of the year: spring and summer. The symbolic associations of spring and summer are many, and they are largely positive. Spring is often associated with innocence and new life, as it is the time of year when the earth and plants seem to reawaken from their winter sleep, and the world grows green and lush again. New animals are born. Spring leads to summer, and flower buds turn into full blooms, as the world seems to explode into color. It is a somewhat more mature time than spring, but it is still bursting with life and overflowing with abundance. In likening his love to “a red, red rose” that is “newly sprung in June,” the speaker emphasizes the passionate romantic feelings he has for his lover as well as borrows the connotations of spring and summer—the liveliness, the lushness, and the abundance of those seasons—to characterize his love as well.