In the red corner: the muck, grit and harsh truths of life. In the blue corner: the beauty of the natural world and the vivid variety provided by imagination. Cathy Bryant is dancing about somewhere in between.

To continue the boxing ring metaphor to a silly (but possibly accurate) degree, the other two corners are culture and experience, the canvas is time and I'm on the ropes of conscience.

For Cathy is stuck as a misfit. Born in the south, she lives in the north. from a middle class home, she is working class by poverty and experience. She knows what it's like to be homeless, and what it's like to pick a dirty penny off the pavement and be happy to have it, and she also know the correct way to address a duchess, and whether to put the milk in first. She doesn't fit in anywhere - except at poetry events, where you can't know whether the person next to you is a convicted felon, a linguistics professor, or both.