Dear Sandy and Jim,
Gord and I have just heard of Stewart's death. How hard to accept that loss. Gord and I send our heartfelt sympathy. I offer you a poem I wrote awhile ago:
when you are gone
how thoughtless death is
never right, never ready,
never when you’ve got
summer in jars; winter battened
down and stored beneath the stairs
tidy as anything, no— death insists on the middle,
as if the unfolding of your red petals
with the sun translucent behind you doesn’t matter,
as if the butter you melted isn’t needed
for the dough, as if the map of the gridded streets,
crossing each other at right angles, was worthless
anyway
Marla Sloan
