And I "third" Rose's nomination.

Yes, Janet, please write an obituary for Maz.

Dear Rose, and everyone,

I'm not on firm ground here, since I didn't know the poet at all. But this is the second time, since I've signed on to the 'Sphere, that I've heard of a fine poet who has passed away without leaving a published collection. It seems like a terrible shame, and I'm just trying to think of alternatives to letting her work simply disappear.

Of course, the history of literature is filled with cases of people who have banded together to preserve someone's work in cases like these. Saussure comes immediately to mind: he never published his Course in General Linguistics, his students got together after his passing, compared the notes they'd made, and put together a book. And there are of course a number of poets who published little or nothing in their lifetime (Emily Dickinson is a good example) whose work was collected by others posthumously. Imagine if someone had found Dickinson's notebooks, and not taken steps to preserve them!

And the circumstances here seem to indicate there is no family member to make it her mission to be certain the poems are gathered and preserved. It seems a worthy goal, but if someone were going to do it, it would have to be her friends and colleagues. Of course, the world has changed since those two cases I've mentioned, but in some ways those changes have made such a project easier.

So, here's an idea. A web site could be built where her poems could be preserved. Domain name registration and web hosting would cost under $80 for a year, and we could likely find something for even less than that. I would imagine a collection could be taken up to cover this cost. I'm pretty sure we have enough web coding experience among us to put up a simple site collecting all her available poems. We also have enough bibliographers, editors, and librarians here to make sure things are done well. I don't know what would happen to the site in the long run, but if it were up long enough things like the internet archive and the wayback machine would go crawling through, and preserve her work for a good long while.

Perhaps this idea is impractical, or wrong-headed. Perhaps it's been tried before with unsatisfactory results. I don't know the history of such things, I've only been around for three months. But it would be a shame to have the life work of a much beloved poet simply disappear without a trace...

Thanks,

Bill

I'm willing to draft a letter.

I'd like those who love her work to send me the poem they most admire.

I think that it would be best if the letter is signed by several people from different English-speaking countries. That would show how she reached beyond Poole and made a powerful impression on a great many poets. If any established poets are included that will add conviction to what is said.
Of course the letter would have to be approved by everyone who signs the letter.

I'll put up my email address now.
mnemonic@bigpond.net.au

PS: I've copied or printed out all the links in this thread.

What terrible news.

I remember Maz/Grasshopper from many places, she had such a presence.

This thread demonstrates a little of the impact that she had.

Thank you Janet.

Jan

A terrible loss.
Such an exceptional mind and poet: maturity and depth enmeshed with a high-blown sense of mischief and play (I loved the "Jerome" poems).

What saddens me deeply are the circumstances of her death, and what they seem to say about her life. To me and others here she clearly guarded her privacy, a choice that needs to be respected. OTOH, I suppose somehow I always assumed at least some of the online 'community' must know her more personally. I'm surprised how few posting here seem to know little more of her beyond her online persona. How regrettable it seems that a woman so many of us cherished for her literary gifts may not have known that while she lived.


David Anthony writes:
I had that sense as well; here's a poem (posted for critique in 2005) Margaret indicated was about someone else, though I've always wondered if that was true.

Shopping as an Act of Faith

Light buoys her up. Dawn parts
the blinds and burns into her ribs.
She dresses slowly, binds
silk around her torso, listens
to the radio, aware of incoming waves
through her flesh and her wet organs,
deflected by her skeleton into a shimmer
on each high note. A soprano
sings; garden thrushes hunt for snails.
Somewhere in the sky, there is a room
without hardness, without vibration.

Outside the air is green. Deep draughts
of it are heavy, bread in her lungs. People
push too close. Fragile as a wishbone,
she keeps close to the railings. Her radio still plays,
open-throated at the window: Carmen's red flowers
trailing farewell down the street. The music
drops away from her ears, petal by petal. Clouds
shutter the sun. The light begins to leak away.

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

I'm reading my correspondence with Maz. I was worried about her poems being sufficiently and safely published, so I asked about it. It would be good to know which press was nagging her.

Me: How do you feel about publishing in general, Margaret, if you don't mind me asking. Are you ambitious about publishing?

Maz: Re publishing, I really couldn't care less. I've had the editor of a small UK poetry press nagging at me for over 2 years to send him a 60 page manuscript--but ohmigod--60 pages of poems I'd have to consider 'finished'--the idea makes me weak at the knees. Truth is that what I enjoy is the process of writing the poems, gathering them up afterwards and scraping them into some sort of order for a book--nightmare. I don't kid myself that I'm a 'Poet'--I just can't seem to stop writing poems for some reason.

That's beautifully revealing, Mary, and so characteristic of the Maz we knew.
I'm sure she won't mind if her admirers do the job she was reluctant to do for herself. Yes, how do we track down the male small-press editor? There aren't that many, but they're so slow to respond......

Small Press Editor
 

Twas I quoth he!

http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/index.html

Is that right?

Please tell us more, Roger, about yourself and your press. Can you conclude anything more, from your interactions with Margaret, about what she might have wanted or planned?

To give a brief progress report: I still have no information about whether she had a literary executor. I've had no response yet from Neil Prentice (though Alex might have received something he hasn't had time to report), and my e-mail to Tapper Funeral Service got an automated response saying that Mr. Tapper would be out of the office until the 14th but checking e-mail. So efforts continue, but they haven't borne fruit yet.

Maz was both an inventive poet and great critic. It would be interesting to collect some of her crits too. I've certainly got a few of her crits on file.

She certainly lived up to her grasshopper identity, and that persona should perhaps be the one that the poet is identified with.

The foreword to a collection should include the Keats sonnet Alicia posted.

Duncan

Maz gave me permission to publish her "La La Land" here.

Yes, Arrowhead Press. We are a small not-for-profit poetry press. I could take on a Collected of Maz's work, but do not have the time to put it together. Any manuscript forwarded to us should use the contact address on our website. Please note that it would be subject to editing by our poetry editor in the usual way and put on sale via the website. Print costs are quite heavy these days, but I pride myself that our prices are approx. 30% lower than the trade average. A hardback Collected poems would probably have a cover price of around £15.

Looking forward to hearing of any progress. Please use the email address on our website as I cannot log in here very often.

I am so sad to hear this. She was a fine poet, an insightful critic and a witty, funny and really nice person.

I'm glad Rose gave the link to this one, because it was one of the most powerful and poignant poems I have ever read, anywhere. I pleaded with her to send it to the Nemerov--even offered to send it myself and save her the postage--but she didn't take me up on the offer.

Visiting the Surgical Ward

I come festooned with flowers, smiles and grapes,
prepared to play my part, to entertain
and act the fool, a cheery jackanapes
with jokes and japes. I know I must sustain
a jester's role and this facade can't fail
despite the rictus of a monkey grin.
Give me a short red coat that bares my tail
and I will caper like a capuchin

but better that than show the dog behind
my eyes, that blackly hunkers down and whines.
It would attack if only it could find
an enemy to bite. Instead it pines;
for neither simian nor hound can tell
if this goodbye will be our last farewell.

I'd be happy to put together a website if it comes to that (assuming someone better doesn't volunteer). But a real book would be much nicer, IMO.

Googled around and found these yesterday.

http://ramblingrose.com/images/grasshopper600x450.jpg

http://ramblingrose.com/images/grasshopper600x800.jpg

http://ramblingrose.com/images/grasshopper600x600.jpg

Visiting the Surgical Ward

Thx for posting this. Very moving.

This is going wonderfully!
Roger, I apologise for maligning the fleetness of foot of the UK poetry editor. Your response is breathtakingly speedy, and so encouraging. Thank you for seeing the virtues of Maz's work.

Does Pat or someone know if the old Gazebo archives still exist? I'm not able to follow any discussions at the new Gazebo -- all I can see there is the very first post in a thread, probably because you have to be a member to see the rest of the thread. Anyway, as I mentioned earlier Maz has a lot of poems in the archives there. It would be nice if some of those could be considered for inclusion in a collection. I'm so happy that there's talk of publishing her poems; I second what Adam said earlier -- she was a remarkable poet, she was "the real thing".

Christine Potter, the head mod there, says they lost a lot of their archives in a crash this past spring. She's promised to look though.

Petra, Rose kindly got a message through to Chris Potter of the Gaz, and Chris copied me on the response. I'm not looking right at the text of it right now, but it wasn't encouraging: the enormous crash that the Gaz suffered--the one that made it necessary for it to transform itself as it has--destroyed a lot of the archived material, as I understand it. If I understand correctly, that's a sad loss in many ways, but especially in this case.

Still, Gazzers who are not also Sphereans may have Maz pieces in private collections.

Oops, cross-posted with Rose; thanks, Rose.

Thanks, Rose.
Eventually, when I get my old computer hooked up, I can check if I have any of Maz's poems attached to old critiques I wrote in Word files.
I also know that Maz had some big fans out there who might have intentionally collected her poems and saved them. If that's the case, it's actually a good thing under the circumstances and maybe those people could hand over any material they have.
If someone is going to gather together Maz's poems for a book, I hope we can find out who to send material to if we find any.
---
And I cross-posted with you, Maryann. Thanks for your reply, and thanks to Chris Potter.

Forgive me if this has already been posted:

http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/featurpoet/grasshop.htm


and


http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:9CSZ1IgX0pMJ:www.mindfirerenew.com/issue1/0104-mag.html+"M.+A.+Griffiths"+poem&cd=20&hl=en&ct=cln k&gl=us

and

http://www.poets.org/forum/viewtopic...&view=previous

I found an old one in SC by Googling, but it's an unpublished draft so rather than post the link I'll just say the username is ukgrasshopper. - Rose

I've found at least 10 poems by her under the name "grasshopperuk", in archive 4 at Sonnet Central.

Here's a poem that took second place in a contest:

http://docs.google.com/gview?a=v&q=c...en&gl=us&pli=1


And here's another:

http://homepages.nildram.co.uk/~simmers/00afters.htm

About the Worm archive -- I can see poems by Maz at Worm when I google. I'm wondering if that's a site that risks disappearing if she can't pay the fee to the server? In that case I hope someone can go through the archives and get them down before they disappear.

Just went through the thread again and saw that Rose had made a backup copy of Worm. Thank you, Rose.

Here are three of Maz's published poems, at Miller's Pond. Rose mentioned one earlier, but I don't think anyone has mentioned the other two: "The Consuming Angel" and "Afters".
http://www.millerspondpoetry.com/ind...MA%20Griffiths

I've just been surfing the archives at SC and came across what I think is ger first post there in July 2002.

Ding Dong

Great Bast, today she pulled out all the stops,
all faff and fussle to impress her friends;
the bedrooms were a whirl of cloths and mop,
much bathroom bleach sploshed all around the bends,
great waspiness of Hoover on the stairs.
She wore a gypsy scarf to dust and clean,
to brush the suite and tut at velcroed hairs.
I split, aloof,-upheaval's not my scene.
She's donned a dress, a closet lecher's dream,
the pristine kitchen's pregnant with fine food,
the startled rooms and furniture all gleam.
Ding Dong. Her guests arrive in festive mood.
Ah, that's my cue to squat with blissful hiss
and souse the Persian rug with pungent piss.

There's just so much in this - a relish for the richness of language, a keen but humane sense of human foibles - I do hope somehow a collection can be pulled together. I'm happy to help in whatever way I can.

Alan

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