Coffeeshop Writers' Group

I had just printed out a poem for Judy Diaz and was addressing the envelope when Mailman Ken dropped the mail off.

Quickly, I sealed the envelope and ran after him. Here's the poem. It's very sad.

MISSY

in memory of my Siamese cat

who disappeared on August 7

We lived together for a dozen years

happier than any married couple

except for Judy and Irv

who are both gone

and now you, too, my dear Missy

join the ranks of the once-was

In my Bensalem recliner you

purred in my lap

whining, when I excused myself

going outside in the clear

Pennsylvania air to puff on a smoke.

You chased mousies in my glorious

backyard garden with a solemn Buddha

taking it all in

a short trip to the creek beyond

ideal for our solemn unspoken pact

of love and fidelity

Did you think of me when it happened?

Did your sweet gray eyes think of Mother

in our new home in Niwot with our new

friends?

Who will I watch movies with?

Who will nuzzle me when I talk politics over the phone?

I think of you, today, tomorrow and

all the rest of the days.

The house is silent!

It echoes with your presence.

No more mousies in the living room

How I hated them once.

But like your forebears

dating to the wildcat in Africa

you are mandated to hunt

And I am mandated to weep.

Here in the lonesome high-mountain

state of Colorado, where others comfort

themselves by smoking pot.

Missy, my Missy, here you are again.

Sitting in Mother’s lap, as I run my hands

around your impossibly soft gray-as-a-cloud

body that will never ever die.


The only reason I'm printing it is b/c the cat lovers in my writing group want to read it.

I wrote it b/c I thought it would comfort Judy. Grief must be felt and cried over.

Linda Barrett has been working on her sci-fi story "Mother of Society" for several weeks now. It's quite good. We told her she should continue writing poems and bring em in.

Martha, on the left, is really on a roll - Kaiser or poppyseed? - constantly writing so that her husband says, Come to bed, but she can't. Positively cannot.

Her "The Case of the Missing Scrolls" is an entire novella that she has already finished. Various characters are at the archeological dig in Egypt. Each character is based on a member of our writing group.

Bathsheba - aka Dr Bebe - for Beatriz

Caroline for Carly

Matisse for Martha

Ruby for Ruthie

Ian and Irene for Allen and Tatianna.

Martha received the equivalent of a standing ovation from all of us.

 Carly wrote a story about a woman whose life is going along just fine, when she learns to her horror that her very own son is "using."

That's why she called the story Shattered. Great title, Carlana, as well as the story itself.

 Carly told us a truth-is-stranger-than fiction story that happened to her last week. She was outside at her apartment, when who should she see but



Mary Brucker with her guide dog Garland. They had landed at the apartment complex.

Mary, totally blind, was lost. Carly and her husband Charlie brought them inside and after some snacks, sent them on their way.

Donna Krause on the left read a spectacular poem, as they all are. For the first time, the poem was not about her, but about another woman, someone who lives in her Rockledge neighborhood, who's in a wheelchair.



The woman is gonna try and find a man "before my anxiety overtakes my ambition."

I think that covers the waterfront, except for Ruby, I mean Ruthie.

I started my short story last night. Got the idea from one of my psychotherapy clients. I told her I'd probly turn her true story into fiction. She's not even IN the story.

"The Obituary Writer" is about a young woman, pushing 38, who writes the occasional obit for the New York Times.

I've wrin four pages and have no idea what's gonna come next. Carly loved that!

What's coming next, though, in my real life, is the making of a scrumptious scallops dinner that Scott and I will share.