Little did I know when I stepped on to the stage in Wigtown that it would lead to my appearing on Radio Scotland’s main Christmas morning broadcast. It just so happened that the producer of “Christmas Morning with Cathy MacDonald and Ricky Ross” was in the audience, not that I knew that until an e-mail asking whether I’d be interested in reading some poetry for the show popped into my inbox in November.

The show — “A fabulously festive celebration of music and conversation” — starts at 7:05 am. This may seem an unearthly hour to anyone without young children, but I fully expect to have been up for a good while by then, having spent the previous night in a frenzy of wrapping until heaven knows when. Still, if you miss it live — and I wish you the rest that allows that — or are not able to receive Radio Scotland, I imagine you’ll be able to catch up at the link above or through the estimible iplayer.

I’m on twice in the first hour of the programme, chatting with Cathy and Ricky — yes, it is Ricky Ross of of Deacon Blue — and reading some poems. None of the poems are directly Christmas pieces, but the first set very much concerns love and family, and so is quite appropriate for the time of year. It includes some poems from the “10 x 10” sequence published in The Best British Poetry 2011. The poem I read on my second appearance is “Tae a Lousy Piper”!

You needn’t fear for the sanctity of my Christmas morning: it may go out as if live, but it’s all pre-recorded.  In fact, I took an extended lunchtime to do the recording on Wednesday just past and had a fantastic time.

I hope you enjoy the show. I think you will. There’s some great music on it, including live music from the CoroEdina chamber choir. And the other guest I heard recording — Sang Y. Cha, formerly an agent, I think, in Hollywood and now minister of  St Mungo’s Parish Church in Alloa — was certainly intriguing listening.