I wrote a poem about Margaret. It isn't a patch on Alicia's. But we are all engaged in a gulf of grief occasioned by our tears, heartfelt or not.

i.m. Margeret Griffiths

A lady lived in Dorset, thrived in Poole.
She died last month but she would love this tale..
My dad and mom sought Thomas Hardy’s grave,
made pilgimage. A statue on the green
boasted of Hardy, mayor of the town.
“Wrong Hardy,” said my father with a sneer.

There are some stories never learned at school,
pastures where sheep can look at men and quail,
even if they are pissing on a grave.
Then there is Dorset, such a placid scene
where an old woman primly in her gown
dies and her death makes all our deaths draw near.

Lovely, Tim.
Please post it here:

http://thesonnetboard.yuku.com/topic/7220

I subscribed, briefly, to a group of poets among whom Maz was a significant figure. I withdrew because I was contributing little or nothing.

Unhelpfully, I can't remember the name. I can remember what it was, though. It was quite simply an email that would be sent to all participating members, or... well, it was email based, anyway. It was really something very like the discussion boards here, except for the slightly different medium and perhaps the obvious ease of moderation (participation by invitation). I believe, in fact, that the idea of a more closed interactive group sprang from frustrations with usenet (rec.arts.poems or similar). I think I actually first made Maz's aquaintance there, before Able Muse was to be found on the web.

Anyway, WORM was so called because it spread through email as did certain less benign little viral monsters of the same name. The discussion group was named similarly. Anyone remember it? David? I believe the editor of ANON took part. The reason I blather forth all this is because I thought perhaps one or more of that group might offer insight into Maz's background and or more.

Rik Roots? Users of usenet in 97 98 and 99?

Sky in the Pie

Two sure cuts open the crust
and release a rush of dark thrushes
with golden beaks, heralding an arc of stars
borne on a rainbow. The spectrum flexes
like muscle, then settles in a single depth
of colour, blue as the powdered lapis
on a manuscript page in a rich book
of hours, blue as a dunnock's egg, blue
as distance. Take your spoon before
it elopes with the knife, and taste.

The clouds melt on your tongue
and sweeten your throat. You can chant
this day across the meadows, and call the lost flocks
home. The sheep and the chestnut cows. The cows
and the wild black horses. The wolves and small quick foxes.
All the lost beasts of your kingdom.
Call them home.


M A Griffiths

It wasn't Alicia's poem, was it? I believe the poem she posted was written by Keats.

Or am I nuts?

Well, Lo, you may well be nuts anyway ;) . . . but yes, you're right, the poem is by Keats.

http://www.bartleby.com/126/28.html

Editing back to say: I think the impulse to commemorate--whether the tributes come from our own gardens or not--is lovely, and entirely appropriate. I'm glad to see the Keats here, and the other poems, Margaret's own and those written for her. And thank you to David A for the link to Mike Alexander's sonnet at SC.

The Bast (cat) poem is quite delightful--unfortunately, in the discussion, she talks about her plans to
revise the poem; I don't know if she ever did, and if the revised version is available.

Martin

Tim,
very moving tribute, except, unless I'm mistaken, Maz wasn't old--I found one place
that listed her birth year as 1952! Of course, I have no idea if it is reliable, or if it is
really her: http://ukgrasshopper.e.yuku.com/

Martin

I just found this terrifying piece on SC's sonnet archive 8:

.....A conversation with the dark

So tired of it, you bastard, tired of waiting,
tired of halt-breath time, anticipating
your cloven footfalls on my ribs--so blast
your eyes and ears--it's in my hands at last.
You sit like dust again behind the door.
I yank it wide to seize your hair, and roar,
I have you now! And slighter than I knew.
It was your shadow I had feared, not you.

I grasp you, grip you in my termite jaws,
you pissant prick. I seize you in my claws
and squeeze, you rat-turd, arse-wipe, moldwarp, minge.
The stalker stuck, laddo, too late to whinge.
I've grabbed you, gagged you, so don't try to beg.
Shut your throat and listen: Chicken. Egg.

.................................................. ....(Maz)

I've found a poem about a dog that Maz loved and lost. I remember having read it, but at a different site, probably at the Gaz. She says, in one of the posts under the poem, that she has another dog now. She loved animals; I'm sure I'm not the only one who had that impression of her. In the post below the poem, she says: "If animals don't go to heaven, I don't want to go there." I dearly hope she still had her dog when she died:
http://www.robgodfrey.com/burgundy/m...tml?1089772373