Sometimes I love music playing while I paint or write. Bach is especially useful for writing, I find – Glenn Gould keeps my fingers moving on the (computer) keyboard. And I could never mark assignments or do my tax returns without music.

At the moment of beginning again, though, music will not help. In fact, it hinders the shift into a poetic frame of mind as I sit down to write or stand in front of the blank canvas. I wondered for a while why this might be so.

I worked out that it is because it may bring an alien rhythm into the poetic space and may divert my attention when I most need it to be concentrated.

The music may be beautiful or inspiring or moving, but in those moments of beginning I need to hear only my own mood and rhythm.

I need quiet to catch the whispers and attend to what they suggest – a glimpsed colour, a murmured phrase, a hint towards action.