My grandfather collected scraps
Fran Fernández Arce
collaging asks movement to
react to pull
pieces apart
shake up newspaper clippings
to get
going it demands
violence
sharpness
roughness bodily
force it disturbs
boundaries
creates copies while the original ends
up a hollowed
one
➔ My grandfather collected scraps. Everything and anything mildly interesting,
➔ he would snatch it up, jiggle it away from its source. And you could see
➔ how the weight of those scraps would pull down his socks, ruffle up
➔ his grey hair, wear down the muscles in his heart. The past
➔ was never given a chance to pass him by while the future looked like a big pile
➔ of unread newspapers and magazines, unsolved puzzles, unmarked calendars.
➔ Because collaging shifts the edges of time, what happened yesterday
➔ continues today, this, the right now, is trickling down across the page.
➔ So tomorrow I’ll start cutting out the margins in my grandfather’s silhouette.
➔ Cross out the days left in his calendar. Highlight the sight of him by his desk.
➔ Speak of him using the past tense.
Fran Fernández Arce is a Chilean poet currently living in the intersection between Suffolk, England, and Santiago, Chile. She is a poetry reader for The Walled City Journal and poetry editor for Moonflake Press.
