Can “rustique” be used as a form of self-deprecation?

Question

Some years ago, I wrote a take off on a Gilbert Bécaud poem, L'Homme et La Musique, using a technique called parallel construction.

Bécaud's original began:

Moi, moi je suis homme, Et toi tu es la musique.

My version began, closely paralleling the original:

Elle, elle est femme, Et moi je ne suis qu'un rustique​.

My English translation was, “She, she is a woman, Next to her I'm just a peasant (rustique)”. The implication was “I'm not good enough for her.”

Allowing for poetic license, can one use rustique in this way?

_{(Added the following after seeing the comments.)}

Later, the poem continues:

Parce qu'elle est comme le soleil, la lune et aussi la moitié, de tous les astres de la Grande Vie Lactée.

“Because she's like the shining sun, the moon, and also half the stars, That populate the Milky Way.”

Does the first “rustique” verse make a good “counterpoint” (or “foil”) for the above?

Answer 1

Rustique is not necessarily peasant. Here, it probably means either crude, ill-mannered or plain, as per

I. A. 2. b)
β) Péjoratif. Rude, grossier, sans savoir-vivre. […]
γ) Par extension. Qui a la simplicité sans façon et un peu fruste que l'on prête aux gens de la campagne.^TLFi

either way, though rustique is not precisely flattering in most contexts, I wouldn't use it to mean “not good enough” by itself. For instance, here, the self-deprecating implication is conveyed by qu' rather than rustique.

Answer 2

Yes, rustique can have this deprecating connotation. It can also have a positive connotation in other contexts. For example, charme rustique evokes a nostalgy for the (imagined) pleasant simplicity of the country life of yesterday, the good old days. In your case, un rustique is a peasant, unwashed or at least uncouth and uneducated, ill-mannered, not suited to the high-brow gentrified city life. The negation “je ne suis qu'” makes it apparent that the qualifier is negative (it would come out as probably negative even with just “je suis un rustique”, but the use of ne que makes it unambiguous). I think you got the undertone exactly right.