WELCOME
it all starts with a
memory
I have been told that, on November 7, ’44, I was born in San Polo d’Enza, in the foothills province on the Reggio Emilia side of the Enza stream, while Allied planes, after several unsuccessful attempts, succeeded in bringing down the bridge connecting my village with the Parma side. So, I was told that I was born under bombs and not under a cabbage like everyone else, but I have long since stopped believing in fairy tales….
Traveling has always attracted me.
As a child, on “that bridge” with my mother, I would gaze at an illuminated country in the distance and wonder what it concealed. As I grew up, that longing became a compass and brush: art, with its labyrinths, translated into shapes and colors my need to leave, to dig beyond the horizon, to make eternal the moment before arrival
t all starts witth an
an idea
“SMITHEREENS”
I spend my days
Collecting smithereens.
I find them on buses
In department stores
And on busy pavements.
At restaurant tables
I pick up the leftovers
Of polite conversation
At railway stations
The tearful debris
Of parting lovers.
I pocket my eavesdroppings
and store them away.
I make things out of them.
Roger McGough