I pronounced my words too carefully,

clicked every consonant, wallowed

in dipthongs, vowels, no elisions,

nothing slurred, each filleted syllable declaimed

with Jeeves-and-Wooster Englishness,

playing Young Sir to audiences

of foreign students. Each day's Dictation

had every fricative and glottal stop

in place. The fault of generosity perhaps,

wanting to be unambiguous.

I should have – brackets – (but never did)

offered them Southern drawl, the too-tooquite

far-back of strawberry teas, for this

was Cambridge and life was summer-languorous,

trailing fingers from a punt. I could have – brackets –

(being truer to myself) taught them my native

adenoidal Scouse: Yer wot, Ah eh,

Know worra mean like then ar kid?

I spoke in synonyms getting things across:

boast, swagger, bluster, bombast, brag.

No wonder – brackets – (and no forgiving me

back North) my people were sarky with me:

Who the fuck d'y think yer talkin to? they said.

Me with me slowed-down poncey syllables,

synonyms, commas, colons and full stops.