Golden Pen Award
(In Memoriam)
HELEN F. BLACKSHEAR (1911--2003)

OLD GRIEF

I told myself it's better that you died,
for love grown old is bitter on the tongue,
but then a surge of dogwood blossoms flung
across the greening hill brings back the tide
of buried grief, and tears I thought had dried.
Or then, I hear a snatch of lyric sung
that once we loved--or, caught among
the crowds the echo of your laugh--
and know I lied.

Helen F. Blackshear, Montgomery, Alabama, was former Alabama Poet Laureate and the winner of the 2001 National Senior Poet Laureate Award. Hers is one of three love poems selected in honor of deceased senior poets laureate.