Memories Poems – Bev Tappan

FOR COUSIN BARB

Bev Tappan — Sat, 16 Sep 2023 00:11:00 +0000

Dear Cuz, I think about you
Every morning when I make
My half of the connected beds
And smooth out the gigantic quilt
You made to cover them both

I recollect we played with paper
Dolls beneath the branches of
Our grandfathers’ hydrangea bush
Not knowing of the sorrows we
Would face along with many joys.

You lost a brother to pneumonia
While serving in the Vietnam War
And then were left a teenager
With a defective infant
Who after all did well enough.

And after many happy years
With a good man found yourself
Alone, confused and wandering
On a cold and snowy night
Towards a merciful pneumonia.

Bev reads at ESOM – 7/22

Bev Tappan — Mon, 18 Jul 2022 18:32:00 +0000

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike – July 18, 2022
hosted by Dan Tappan

On a Summer Evening
My Grandfather’s House

Bev read at ESOM – 4/22

Bev Tappan — Mon, 04 Apr 2022 17:38:00 +0000

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike – April 4, 2022

hosted by Dan Tappan
Timing is Everything
A Backward Glance

Bev reads at ESOM – 10/21

Bev Tappan — Mon, 18 Oct 2021 18:01:00 +0000

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike on October 18, 2021.

hosted by Dan Tappan
White Mountain Art
A Show Of Colors (Autumn 2016)
On October 12th

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike on October 4, 2021

Dan Tappan host
A Recollection
My Grandfather’s House

RIVERWOODS POEMS: LOOKING BACK

Bev Tappan — Thu, 22 Sep 2016 21:06:30 +0000

LOOKING BACK

I see them now, the friends of my childhood.

We had the run of the Pine Hill neighborhood:

Out on the vacant lot swinging at softballs,

Called home by porch bells and whistles at nightfall.

Pauline was my first mate, found at age three.

Then there were Millie and Peewee and Jeanne.

We walked as a foursome to the Anderson School,

Played Cowboys and Injuns in adjacent woods.

Weekends and evenings older brothers joined in

For Kick the Can, Ringolivio or Sardines,

Scrambled on cliffs overlooking the hospital,

(Conveniently placed should one of us fall)

Or perhaps tried a game of croquet in our yard,

Rollerskating or biking or rainy day cards.

Those were Depression days, parents worked hard.

Those were our glory days, fondly remembered.

(Inspired by our Chorus’ rendering of “Song for the Mira”

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: MY GRANDFATHER’S HOUSE

Bev Tappan — Mon, 25 Jul 2016 14:17:37 +0000

MY GRANDFATHER’S HOUSE

Under the hydrangeas on the front lawn

I played with little dolls, the ones

You cut dresses for out of sewing scraps,

Envying my cousins their sibling

Camaraderie. Blackberries bubbled

In pastures overgrown with birches

Where no wolves loitered and rose

Again at breakfast dewy with cream.

The linoleum was cool under feet admonished

To wear sandals. Sunlight baptized

The dining room and half an acre

Of canning vegetables and cucumbers

To be salt-layered in crocks. Roosters

With a glad cry woke me on the airy

Piazza where insects ticking on screens

Had lulled me to sleep. My humpty-dumpty

Grandfather brought four daughters and

Eliza Jane down from New Brunswick

To start a new century in a new land.

A master carpenter, he built their house

Commodious with indoor plumbing. My

Youngest aunt was married in the parlor

While I, a flower girl with stage fright,

Cried on the oak stairs. By that front

Window my grandmother’s cheek

Was granite under my lips when Aunt

Pearl led me to her coffin. “Let

Your vittles shut your mouths,” Grandpa

Advised his grandchildren at the table.

Every Thanksgiving the hydrangeas were brittle

Brown cotton candy on fragile sticks.

RIVERWOODS POEMS: A MEMORY

Bev Tappan — Tue, 12 Jan 2016 18:42:33 +0000

A MEMORY

A squealing pulley, flapping angels:

Wilbur’s poem recalls to mind

Sixty years ago in Maine

I fastened clothespins on a line.

At my feet a red-capped youngster

At my back the veterans’ barracks,

Sheets wind-whipped as they were hung

Fingers numb and face wind-slapped.

When I turned to find my son

He was nowhere to be found

Playing hide and seek with Mom,

Laughing behind our open door.

There is no price I would not pay

To live that life again today.

MEMORIES: THE SNOWS OF CHILDHOOD

Bev Tappan — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 02:02:58 +0000

THE SNOWS OF CHILDHOOD

When the northeast wind drops a snowy

Sail and drapes it over our backyard,

And the halos of angel choristers glow

All over the ebony bowl of heaven,

I pull on my wooley snowpants

And plant my boots in my father’s tracks

To help shovel out our garage.

Above a furry muffler and below

A knitted cap, my cheeks are slapped

Red as my Yorkshire cousins’, who once

Dug paths to the barn. With a small spade

I cut cakes as square as ice cubes

And fling them onto ramparts over my head.

My father and I sing Jingle Bells.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: A RECOLLECTION

Bev Tappan — Fri, 13 Nov 2015 02:33:55 +0000

A RECOLLECTION

My father taught me how to fish

Casting his lure to the pickerel weeds

Where slender shadows would be seen

That could make a savory breakfast dish

When fried well coated with cornmeal.

At other times we trolled for bass

While I rowed and he trailed his line

Baited to make a small mouth decide

It could not let that target pass,

A treat too tempting to decline.

I learned to hold the quarry close,

Slide my hand gently down the fins,

Wait for the tail to cease to swing,

Then softly work the barbed hook loose

So that it could be baited again.

At night the horn pout were our choice

With bulbous heads and smooth black coats

And sweet pink flesh we’d come to know.

Their tentacles we tried to avoid.

Our lantern brought them to our boat.

My father and I were often at odds.

I wasn’t the boy scout he might have preferred.

I did not always heed his words.

But I can cherish this memory now

Of me at the oars and him in the stern.

TAMWORTH POEMS: MOUNTAIN TOP EXPERIENCE

Bev Tappan — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 15:56:51 +0000

MOUNTAIN TOP EXPERIENCE

We have clickity clacked to the misty summit

Of New England’s tallest weather-wracked peak,

Cog after cog dropping into their sockets,

I accompanied by my kids and their kids

(Hoping we won’t slide back to our doom).

At the age of ten I first ascended the trail

That ran from the railroad base to the Lake

Of the Clouds to the tip-top and down the Jewel,

My mother in sneakers and black print dress

(The last ascent my parents tried).

But I got to know Mt. Washington well:

Repairing cairns in the Alpine Meadows,

Boulder-hopping down Huntington Ravine,

Traversing to Madison Hut and back,

And watching skiers bolt down Tuckermann’s.

I have grown fond of the ancient rock pile.

It was good to re-visit an old friend.