I unpeeled the cellophane and tilted the album to one side. The record slid into my hand. I took it over to the record player and placed it on the turntable. I lifted up the arm and, as the disc began to move, carefully brought the needle down upon its surface, and the revolution began.

A Note about the Poems

A number of poems which appear in the diary have been inspired – loosely, or heavily – by other poems, pop songs, Christmas carols and French grammar books.

1st January: Gil Scott-Heron, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (1971)

5th January: Morrissey, Everyday is Like Sunday (1988)

6th January: Wilfred Owen, Anthem for Doomed Youth (1917)

7th January: Emily Dickinson, Because I Could Not Stop For Death (1890)

11th January: Joyce Kilmer, Trees (1913)

23rd January: a tweet by Ian McMillan with the same title and format

2nd February: Philip Larkin, This Be The Verse (1971)

19th February: William Carlos Williams, This Is Just To Say (1934)

22nd February: The Bee Gees, Stayin’ Alive (1977)

24th February: Dylan Thomas, Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night (1947)

27th February: The Lord’s Prayer

7th March: Stevie Smith, Not Waving But Drowning (1957)

8th April: New Testament, Mark Ch. 16

26th April: Kate Bush, Wuthering Heights (1978)

27th April: James Brown, Get Up (I Feel Like Being a Sex Machine) (1970)

10th May: Carol Ann Duffy, The World’s Wife (1999)

16th May: Richard Rodgers, My Favourite Things (1959)

19th May: Collins Easy Learning French Grammar and Practice (2016)

8th June: Adrian Henri, The New, Fast Automatic Daffodils (1967)

25th June: John Cage, 4´33˝ (1952)

1st July: Edward Thomas, Adlestrop (1917)

29th July: R.E.M., Everybody Hurts (1992)

2nd August: W.H. Auden, Funeral Blues (Stop All the Clocks) (1936)

25th September: Elizabeth Barrett Browning, How Do I Love Thee? (1850)

29th September: Blur, Parklife (1994)

6th October: A. A. Milne, Buckingham Palace (1924)

11th November: Clive James, The Book of My Enemy Has Been Remaindered (1983)

23rd December: John Henry Hopkins, Jnr, We Three Kings (1857)

Acknowledgements