On finding an old cassette

In the antechamber, upholstery of decreased turgor, tented by the pinch,
Was slow to revert, and my head was swimming with tropes, false confessions, postiches.
I court the short, flat brush of Salgado. My past is redolent of David Lynch;
I liked the portraits that flattered nobility, whilst evidence of my species
In classical music was anathema to me; and my joyless repression
Strikes me ad nauseam when I listen to myself talking in an old session
Of psychotherapy, recorded onto cassette in 1993.
In my twenties, I kidded myself that strings were playing supernaturally,
And I couldn’t listen to choral pieces at all; I liked portraits constructed
From templates, so that the sitters appear similar, with eyes puffily ducted,
Because I felt threatened by diversity and life and jism; and I declared
My heroes to be Rupert Brooke and Stephen Fry, and made noises of blame, and shared
The plot for a novel I was working on, but at 21 I could not know
How I felt. I had not read Tagore or Hart Crane; and now I invite colour (will
It come to one who lauded the template?), and court the short brush of Salgado;
Whilst I defend my younger self, and listen to Morrissey’s “Unlovable”, still.