I dressed in old Levi cords, so faded they could have got a pension and wow, were they comfortable or what. One more wash, you know, they were history… sayonara and good night.

I pulled on a hooded black sweatshirt, to accessorize my hooded eyes, it read ‘I’M A GAS’. Yeah, just couldn’t stem the humour, I was a real fuckin’ comedian.

Completed the outfit with a pair of battered moccasins that whispered, ‘I love your feet… I love you.’

Sure felt like it. Put some gel in my hair to get that wet look. When you’re forty-two years old, you’ll try any gimmick. It made my hair look wet which I guess is the point. I hoped for that crumpled Don Johnson effect but I got close-call wino. Tried that American voice again, roared ENOUGH ALREADY! And went to read the MacNeice piece.

‘Without heroics, without belief

I send you, as I am not rich

Nothing but odds and ends a thief

bundled up in the last ditch

for few are able to keep moving

they drag and flag in the traffic

while you are alive beyond question

like the dazzle on the sea my darling.’

Hey! Are you getting this? Here’s some more purely as introduction.

‘The bullfight, the fanderillas like

Christmas candles

And the scrawled hammer and sickle

It was all copy – impenetrable surface

I did not look for the sneer beneath the surface

Why should I trouble, an addict to oblivion

Running away from the Gods of my own hearth

With no intention

Of finding Gods elsewhere.’

You don’t get it Cooper do you… I know you don’t but, by Christ, you will. Here endeth the lesson, memorise the underlined pieces. Auden gave some lines to MacNeice, I think they had you in mind. I’ll sign off with them.