REH Word of the Week: maws
Monday, March 15, 2010
posted by Barbara Barrett
maws
noun
1. a receptacle into which food is taken by swallowing; 2. the throat, gullet or jaws especially of a voracious animal
[Origin: before 12th century; Middle English, from Old English maga; akin to Old High German mago stomach; Lithuanian makas purse]
HOWARD’S USAGE:
Shoulder to shoulder and leg to leg,
Red maws agape for gore,
Futile to cringe to kneel or beg,
One leap—and the chase is o’er.Fierce on my flanks your hot breaths burn
And the weak must serve the strong
And the weak must die but here I turn—
I have fled you overlong.
[from “A Warning to Orthodoxy”; for the complete poem see The Collected Poetry of Robert E. Howard, p. 422; and Shadows of Dreams, p. 20]
