I found that accolade a little whimsical, but perhaps no more so than the thought that crossed my own mind; that its predestined place is in St Andrews, on Market Street, a bronze plaque on a plinth supporting a statue of the old man himself. It is typical of his style, simple words complicated by fussy grammar and a built-in reminder of the Lesley of the Elegies alongside the later Lesley.
There's a lot I don't especially like about the poem; the clock tick-tocking and the stumble in line 11; the academic question holding the poem at arm's length and the selfconscious backward echoes, via Larkin, of Housman, Marvell, Shakespeare... but the title begs my forgiveness. This is (written in) the voice of an old, slowly-educated, benign curmudgeon and would do well in the place I suggested, with an added nod to Yeats: Girlies, go by.
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