An ancient poem about Philip Larkin and me

As I now seem to be publishing my embarrasing juvenalia:

In the bright September sun

(the town was so hazy, beautiful)

To find the right measure of intensity

(reading Larkin's poems)

seemed such an impossible task.

Only schooled in uncertainty,

I was in search of a suitable mask.

But looking through the bus window, I felt,

that my failure was confirmed by his art

and the blue unreachable nothingness meant

that for me there was no acceptable part

in this cruel old play, and thus, without words to say,

my youth, my life, was spent.