'I visited Ireland back in June for three weeks to do a cycling tour and write some poetry. It was actually my third time here. For some reason I've always felt a kinship with Ireland. I don't have Irish ancestry but I do have Celtic connections because there's Scottish blood in my family.

Anyway, I arrived in Dun Laoghaire on the ferry and stayed there for one night before setting off to explore Dublin the following morning. On my way towards the city centre, I stopped off in this lovely little square near the new stadium. It was just like a square you'd see in Oliver Twist. While there, I chatted to some builders, changed a puncture, took some photos and for some reason unknown to me, I moved my poetry book from my luggage at the back of the bike to my bag on the handle bars. Then I cycled into town, past Stephen's Green, down towards the Liffey and onto Heuston station where I planned to catch a train to Limerick later that day.

When I got to the station, this poem started to come to me so I went to get my book out and it wasn't there. That moment was one of the worst of my life to date. I felt complete and utter loss. In a way, it's like a sin to say but it's in the top five bad things that have happened to me in my life and that's the truth. That book contained four-and-a-half years of my work.

After discovering the book was gone, I suppose I kind of lost the plot a bit. I turned the bike around and headed back into the traffic. I went up this hill and a tram nearly ran me over, which resulted in a bicycle policeman stopping me. He got his notebook out and demanded to know why I was in the middle of the road and going the wrong way. I explained about losing my work and he didn't book me but told me not to be so reckless on the bike or I'd end up losing my life as well. I calmed myself down a bit after that and made my way back to that quaint square but there was no sign of the book. I didn't really know what to do next but felt that I had to keep to my original plans and travel to Limerick or I'd be a complete fraud as a poet, so I boarded the train.

As hard as it was, I'm glad I carried on with my travels. I cycled from Limerick to Kilkee and then over to Loop Head, through the Burren in Co Clare and onto Galway city. The characters and people I met through the loss of the book really inspired me. Even a lady working on the train asked what was wrong with me. I thought that was really beautiful. I must have looked very forlorn because she came straight out and said it. I find people are very real in Ireland and they come at you right in the heart. My trip to Ireland was definitely a ying and yang adventure and it has taken me on a new journey in terms of my work.

The pain I feel at the loss of my book is very acute and it has taken a lot to rise above that pain but I feel Ireland has given me that strength. If the book of poetry isn't at the bottom of the canal and is in the hands of someone who got something out of it then that would make me happy. Maybe it will get them interested in writing or something.

I'm making one last attempt to locate it because I feel a lot of the work from that four- and-a-half years' worth of poetry, from my own point of view, was my best work but if I don't get it back then I can tell myself that I've given my best work to Ireland."