A happy memory …

… I Once Met... Stevie Smith - Patric Dickinson - The Oldie. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

In this exalted company, a schoolboy in his early teens was doubtless an unwelcome presence. But Stevie Smith was very sweet to me, sat me down and with penetrating eyes asked me about myself – what I was studying at school, what I enjoyed doing and other such questions but not (as far as I can remember) what poetry I liked. In the photograph I took, she is clutching a cigarette and wearing (as she often did) the collar of a white blouse over the top of her dress. But for some reason it is her knitted stockings of which I retain the most vivid memory.