Bev Tappan

Category: Poems

All poems

  • REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: OUR CHRISTMAS CAROL

    OUR CHRISTMAS CAROL

    We named you for the season but we did not

    Know what elfin influence your name would bestow,

    For as we came to learn in later years

    You were the mischief maker in the family

    Who dared your younger brother to walk buck

    Naked in the snow to the wall and back,

    Enticed your younger sister to taste a little

    Temptingly sweet-smelling acrid vanilla

    And your baby sister to try a bite of dog fare.

    Treasure hunts in the mossy clearing were your

    Work and forced marches down our gravel drive.

    Big sister led her siblings a merry chase

    For which she has long since been forgiven because 

    She also led them to Bye Bye Miss American Pie.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: OUR SARAH

    OUR SARAH

    On the night you were born the snow had fallen all day,

    Drifting, walling us into our house on the hill,

    And since we knew that you were on your way

    We waited and prayed for the plow which did not come.

    As dark approached we thought to ride the toboggan

    To meet with a cab on the road at the foot of the Heights.

    Of course the plow did finally come in time

    But that is how I think of your arrival:

    A flight straight into our hearts over whispering white.

    And that is why I think you were the child

    To try a skateboard, parachute out of a plane,

    Ride on your Yamaha into the White Mountains,

    Run your half-marathons and keep up

    With your fast-peddling husband on mountain bikes

    And hundred mile road races, and why

    You still keep moving, living life on the fly.

  • TAMWORTH POEMS: A CHANGE OF MOOD

    A CHANGE OF MOOD

    The storm has passed.  The pines bend low

    Beneath the ruthless weight of snow.

    The air is thick.  My spirits sag.

    This dismal day bodes news that’s bad.

    Our power’s out.  The house is dark.

    The frigid car is loath to start.

    But down the road an hour or so

    A patch of blue sky starts to show.

    A hint of sunshine lights the sky.

    And soon the pines begin to rise,

    Flaunt white Christmas bows and ties

    Sparkling gaily in the sunlight.

    Then I begin to realize

    That my despair will lift in time.

  • JAPAN POEMS: 22 HAIKUS

    TIME TRAVEL #1

    Westward to Japan

    We fly into tomorrow

    Before today ends.

    JAPANESE TODDLER

    Petite and sad-eyed,

    When gifted with a toy car

    She glows with wonder.

    JAPANESE FATHER

    The headphones he fits

    To his daughter’s tiny head

    Are like a blessing.

    FALL REUNION

    Three old Japanese

    Comrades smile for our camera

    At the Buddhist shrine.

    GINGKO BILOBA

    Maidenhair fossil

    Tree, you are said to be the

    Cure for all life’s ills.

    jAPAN CITIES

    Swarming urban hives,

    Every bus a cattle car,

    Each crossing, Times Square.

    FORECAST

    Japan, exemplum

    Of the word “congestion”:

    Our planet’s future.

    THE PHILOSOPHERS’ WALK

    Lined with cherry trees

    By a flowing waterway,

    A respite from crowdS.

    A FAR CALLING

    From the Zushi train

    We see a glimpse of Fuji,

    Clear but far away.

    THE TRAIN TO TAKAYAMA

    Along a river

    Cut into volcanic rock

    The night falls early.

    TAKAYAMA TO NAGOYA

    Bullet trains cut straight

    Through and between mountainsides

    Gowned in fall colors.

    MEMENTO MORI

    At Hase temple

    Kites circle over our heads.

    Death is never far.

    AT THE ZOO

    With unhopeful eyes

    The elephant looks at me

    And I feel ashamed.

    APPEARANCES CAN BE DECEIVING

    Fragrant lychee fruit,

    Your delicious white sweetness

    Hides in your rough rind.

    THE HAKONE YAJIKITA

    Painted charlatan,

    You gull foreign visitors.

    You are no ryokan.

    TAKAYAMA MARKET

    Your vegetables

    Astonish foreign viewers:

    So big, so perfect!

    RESTING PLACE

    Towering cedars

    Shelter a benign spirit:

    Koyasan’s founder.

    LITTLE TREES

    Gracious persimmons,

    Your golden globes light our way

    And your fruit hangs low.

    AUTUMN SPLENDOR

    Delicate fingered

    Fiery red gold maples:

    Fall epiphony.

    ANOMALY

    Sea of sand and stone

    At the Silver Pavilion

    A respite from crowds.

    PETITION

    Gnarly limbed old pine,

    Symbol of longevity,

    Teach us how to age.

    TIME TRAVEL #2

    As I’ve longed to do,

    We fly back in time, but we

    Don’t fly far enough.

  • JAPAN POEMS: ODYSSEY

    ODYSSEY

    I have returned to Japan after thirty years

    Since our youngest daughter made her way

    To complete in Osaka her BU college degree.

    Her father was still jogging every day.

    Life and the rice fields were still green.

    On this fall visit to Japan I plead

    For some relief from grief.  I ask

    The gracious Buddha for heart’s ease.

    And as the strenuous swift days pass

    Through alien and exotic scenes,

    I sense a slowly growing distance

    Between my sweet lost loves and me,

    A moat of separation from the past.

    Though no less dear their features be,

    I stand outside the looking glass

    Between what is and what can never be,

    Between acceptance and a world of pain,

    And lightening my dark misery

    I feel a welcome sense of peace.

    The rice stalks now are drying in the fields.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: BALD EAGLES

    BALD EAGLES

    Today my heart leaped up as I

    Beheld two monarchs of the air

    Circling over White Oak Drive

    In search of errant squirrel and hare.

    As their black wings sailed on the wind,

    The sun lit up white heads and tails.

    They made four sweeping rounds until

    They headed north for our Great Bay.

    The Bay’s their winter habitat

    With osprey, loon, black duck and grebe.

    We’re glad to have our eagles back:

    They awe us with their majesty.

  • TAMWORTH POEMS: CALL OF THE WILD

    CALL OF THE WILD

    Driving north in the pelting rain

    I see a line of wild geese arrowing

    Southwest toward more clement climes,

    Harvest gleanings on their minds.

    I hear the faint persistent calls

    By which they organize themselves.

    Already one is flapping forward

    To take the lead, relieve his comrade.

    Why is it that I feel compulsion

    To join this southerly migration?

    Is it the winter that I’d flee

    Or would I be one of that company?

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: HANGING IN THERE

    HANGING IN THERE

    The flashy flaunting maples

    Have had their say and oaks

    Now hold their tawny sway:

    Orange melanged with bronze

    Mingled with hints of green

    The eye is pleased to linger on.

    And so too do slim beeches

    Add ocher notes to the scene,

    All joining in fall’s final fling

    And in no hurry to let go.

    Skiers will find leaves lingering

    On branches laced with snow.

    A tip of the hat to tenacity!

    Why not prolong the final bow?

  • POETRY ASSIGNMENT: WHAT A WORK OF ART SAYS TO YOU

    THE OSAKA VASE

    The lamplight glides off the sloping sides

    Of the blue-gray stoneware Osaka vase.

    My daughter, the potter, had asked advice

    From her teacher with the long black hair

    And gentle hands on how to inscribe

    In vertical kanji a plea for peace

    Inspired by her Hiroshima pilgrimage.

    This old vase of some thirty years

    Has suffered breakage and repairs.

    Equally old are the skeletal stalks

    Of the dried flowers and reeds it holds

    Which we found in the Victorian home

    A block or two from our children’s school.

    It sends a mute and ancient message

    Still falling on deaf human ears.

  • TAMWORTH POEMS: THE WORKS OF JAYS

    THE WORKS OF JAYS

    As autumn leaves begin to fall,

    Blue jays suddenly appear.

    Although we do not hear them call

    They fitfully flit here and there.

    All summer they have silently

    Flown about their busy-ness.

    Some say that they’ve been stealthily

    Stealing from their neighbors’ nests.

    In spring we heard them constantly

    Sounding their rude and raucous cries,

    Warning their fellow flyers away

    From male-selected nesting sites.

    But now it is the acorn crop

    That they are fiercely focused on,

    Interring nuts in shallow tombs

    For winter harvest under snow.

    It’s said, without their ministries

    Our oaks would not be so widespread:

    And so it is that minor deeds

    Have wide and weighty consequence.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: THE SOUND OF POETRY

    THE SOUND OF POETRY

    (Inspired by the Concord Inn Open Mike Program)

    A song is meant to be sung.

    A poem is meant to be said:

    Here are the ways I’ve gone,

    Here are the thoughts I’ve had.

    Vignettes along the road,

    Bits of scenes remembered,

    Sightings from my window:

    A poem is meant to be read.

    Music of assonant words

    Strung like the notes of a bird,

    Joined in a measured tread:

    A poem is meant to be heard.

    (October, 2014)


  • TAMWORTH POEMS: HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW

    HIS EYE IS ON THE SPARROW

    This morning before the service began,

    With caution and care and celerity

    Lyn captured a bee on the coffee stand

    And carefully gave it its liberty,

    Freeing it from its glass enclosure

    Over the rail of the little back porch.

    Though fearful of bee stings and fatal reactions,

    She practiced Schweitzer’s reverence for life,

    Which later proved an apt introduction

    To the blessings of the animals rite:

    A concept which folks would do well to extend

    To all of their dealings with fellow men.