[John Whitworth]

Ah Michael, you are, as ever, too intellectual for me. But I take it you are writing that left-liberal poetry.

A picket line gig is presumably a poetry reading given to a picket line. The mind boggles. I suppose you could read 'em Percy Bysshe. Those workers who like poetry (and there are some) tend to like it to rhyme and scan, in my experience.

But all left-wingers who enjoy nice salaries are hypocrites unless they give most of it away, aren't they? Of necessity. Being a right-winger, I keep what I get, such as it is.