A Candle for Saint Barbara and Other Poems
by
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Guardian of your childhood, A Courteous Cat Encountered
Saint Barbara, when we met,
Was wood, worm-eaten and covered over
With silver, except for a faded face of paint–
Yet demanded
On her Eve and Night
A candle.
The candles one by one have burned,
Have lighted many rooms,
Until, instead of wood and paint,
Instead of silver, is the Saint.
*
12/3/77
The narrow
Way
I
Walked
Today
Was blocked.
Tight-curled
In sleep
A cat
Lay there
But courteously
Unfurled
And rolled aside
Onto the grass
To let me pass.
*
4/26/96
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About the Book
The poems in this book were written over a period of decades and the subjects are the usual ones: love and death, with an occasional theme drawn from history or nature. Several poems were published by The National Library of Poetry, two (Wise Fools, in 1993; Ouch! [Once bitten...] in 1996) appeared in LIGHT, the quarterly of light verse. Two were published by The Modern Poetry Society; they were Near Philippi, in 1995 and Memory, in 1996. The Exile was accepted by Ararat in 1978, but whether published or not, I do not know. Sleeping Cats was published in The Writer either in 1976, 1977 or 1978.
About the Author
Mary, née Monill, Tius was born in December 1928 in Portland, Maine. She attended local schools and, on graduating from High School, attended, and in June 1949, graduated from Syracuse University. In August of that year she travelled to Izmir, Turkey, where she had been appointed to teach English at an American school for Turkish girls. In that position, she remained for three years. In 1959, the Tiuses moved to Greece where they lived for the next 26 years. For the first twelve years, the family included a son, born like his father and paternal grandparents, in Izmir.