Here’s the Weather

Today in London, the weather man speaks
of damp & of cold. In Scotland it’s dreich
with outbreaks of smirr, the occasional hoolie,
advice in the papers to look oot yer woolies,
a sudden dramatic surge & spike
in the sales of three-tiered winterdykes,
the urge to girn & to haiver & blether
carnaptious, forfochen & scunnert by weather,
dance round the double-edged sword of fash,
dinged doon by the elements, loving stramash
and the trauchle of baltic , foonert & droukit
fair molocates fears ye’re a diddy or stupid,
yer puckle concerns on the £ or on Brexit.
It’s the cant o the climate & aabody gets it
eeksie-peeksie, we mump & we greet & we tyauve it
fae Lerwick tae Perth, fae Kirkcaldy tae Hawick,
gan on how we hadnae a summer, it’s affy
and on wi the thermals & semmits & baffies,
gan oot for the messages, endin up pecht
wi the hail turravee, it’s a gey sair fecht
against pavements like ice rinks & wrasslin wi wind
and the nights that forever are fair drawin in,
shilpit & footerin & plooterin awa
through the dubs & the glaur & the clart & the snaw,
stravaigin through cundies & sheughs, a galoot
wi yer brolly destroyed & yer breeks hingin oot,
the haar & the virr & the flaggies & spitters,
the snell air that skelps ye & gies ye the chitters,
that makes ye doolally & drives ye tae swally
and sunbeds & creams tae be less peely-wally.
It’s the weather of language, the language of weather
penning us, writing us all in together,
the patter like watter that aabody kens
fae schemes tae the islands, fae high-rise tae glen.
Fae stooshie tae fankle tae bouroch tae dreck
we’re steeped in the downpour of dialect
which foosts & bumbazes & shoogles & heezes,
skites, dights, invites us, unites us & frees us.