The title I gave to my last collection of poems was Between Silence and Silence.  I have always thought it sad, and occasionally a matter of momentary despair, that each of us emerges from oblivion into life, without permission given, and after a really very brief period of existence is hustled back into oblivion. The time between, full of alarums and excursions, doesn’t make much sense, when you come to think about it, in the context of infinite personal oblivion on either side of the short appearance. For God’s sake, if one may be allowed a small blasphemy, what is it all for?

In an interview Peter Minshall, the great creative genius of the Carnival costume band, was asked out of the blue: …..