Winter Morning in Edinburgh
Scrubbed in the colours of morning the city looks ravished and clean.
Winter's sharp barber has even stropped razors
and shaved the shuddering trees.
I walk through the gelid lather of air
nipping in the cold plunge, nicked scarlet.
A thousand blades of light are window glinting.
O city of matinal mirrors
flecked with periwigs of clouds!
No wonder Hume didn't believe the mind gave birth to this!
Now the Georgian facade is washed in boreal basins
that leave even a pudgy face smarting,
while the trees stand around like bitten sceptics.
Ice on the nerve ends! Come clean!
Let your brain soak in the air's sharp sheen.