Bev Tappan

Category: Poems

All poems

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: A PLACE CAN BE A SOLACE

    A PLACE FOR US

    I have always looked to the hills,

    As the Good Book tells us,

    And I have been soothed

    By dipping my paddle into the still

    Waters surrounding our canoe.

    I have been awed by desert places:

    Zion, Mesa Verde and Arches,

    And under the ocean’s surface,

    From which our ancestors emerged,

    I have been mesmerized by squid

    And captivated by manta rays.

    We humans need our habitat.

    But corporations plunder our planet

    While we breed like flies,

    And scientists seek God in the light

    Of dark matter or the atom’s

    Ever more elusive heart.

    (FEBRUARY 2014)

  • TAMWORTH POEMS: RELUCTANCE

    RELUCTANCE

    How can I bear to think

    That one day I will not see

    Chocorua’s winter-white peak

    And the Three Sisters Ridge,

    That one year without my note

    Pine limbs will bend low

    And birches make their bows

    Under the weight of snow,

    That I will not add my tracks

    To those of the snow-shoe hare,

    The single-footing fox

    And the high-bounding deer

    While ice particles chime

    In the breath of the winter wind

    And cardinals still proclaim

    Their expectations of spring?

    (February, 2014)

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: LAMENT

    LAMENT

    Where and when did it begin,

    This call to me of the wild?

    Was it the chatter of tanagers

    Flitting in Amesbury pines

    Waking a six-year-old child,

    Or was it the dip and dip

    Of my parents’ canoe paddles

    In the Powow River north

    Of camp on Tuxbury Pond,

    Or when I looked up at trees

    And hooked my hand on the smooth

    Bark of birch and aspen

    As I struggled up Mt. Chocorua?

    Later I came to mourn

    The hurricane’s blast, the pines

    Strewn like tangled match sticks,

    The scarlet tanagers gone.

    Today as an octogenarian

    It drives me wild to see

    Our maples migrating to Canada,

    Our Great Bay rank with algy.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: THE ENDLESS QUEST

    THE ENDLESS QUEST

    (Thoughts on hearing Marcelo Gleiser, author of “Life in an Imperfect Universe”)

    Let us cease our fruitless search

    For a unified theory of the universe.

    The force that drives the stars away

    Drives our brief forms of energy

    To question, search, adapt, evolve:

    The mystery is not meant to be resolved.

    Perfection is a false and fatal lure:

    The wily fox outlived the dinosaur.

    The journey is not meant to have an end.

    There’s no one answer out there to be found.

    Natural selection steadily proceeds.

    Only that goes onward which succeeds.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: FIREWORKS

    FIREWORKS

    (On being asked what is the process of writing a poem)

    You’ve seen the Grand Finale

    Start with a single spark

    After which the sky goes dark.

    The pause feels interminable.

    And then another twinkle,

    Faint but unmistakable.

    The wait becomes more bearable:

    The pattern is predictable.

    A snapping, crackling crescendo

    Of stuttering gunfire sends

    Out strands of blinding light,

    Illuminates the looming night.

    Likewise can a poem be born:

    One spark ignites the dawn.

    (January 4, 2014)

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: SNOW DAY

    SNOW DAY

    We welcome snow:

    Flakes falling slow,

    Concealing our tracks,

    Covering our backs.

    No place to go,

    No rows to hoe,

    The world’s gone white.

    We’re sitting tight.

    We hope it snows

    All day, all night.

    (January 2, 2014)

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: EPIPHANY

    EPIPHANY

    Veiled by thickly falling snow,

    Winter robins come and go.

    From my window I can see

    Them flocking in the tall pear tree.

    Startled by the passing plow,

    Scattering in a frantic cloud,

    Flitting, fluttering, never still,

    They seldom pause to eat their fill.

    Off the roof a sudden gust

    Convinces them they’ve had enough.

    I wish them luck, I wish, “God Speed!”

    I hope they find sustaining seed.

    I’m glad I’ve had this chance to know

    Winter robins in the snow.

    (January 2, 2014)

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION

    NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION

    I have to learn to sleep alone.

    With fleece sheets to keep me warm,

    Burrowing into my memory foam ,

    I do my best to sleep alone.

    Curled around his broader form

    I felt his heart beat like my own.

    Now I must learn to sleep alone.

    For all the lonely nights to come

    We must be two: I must be one.

    I have to learn to sleep alone.

    (January 1, 2014)

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: THE LAST OF THE PEARS

    THE LAST OF THE PEARS

    The basket of pears you sent

    From Harry and David arrived

    On time on Christmas Eve.

    They’d tissued each perfect pear

    In festive and seasonal green,

    Beribboned and bedecked,

    But not yet ripe.  Each day

    I nuked a pair in raw sugar

    And rum,  and they were tasty.

    However, on New Year’s Eve

    The last of the pears called out to me,

    Blushing and chilling in the fridge.

    It yielded softly to the knife.

    Sweeter than sugar and more

    Intoxicating than rum, the juice

    Ran down my chin, and I thought,

    “What better way for an old year

    To end or for a new year to begin.”

    12/31/2013

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: THE LAST DANCE

    • THE LAST DANCE
    • When Death decides to come will he wear
    • A tall hat and twirl a cane
    • Like Fred Astaire? Will he ask me
    • To dance?  And will I dare to say yes,
    • Yes I’ve been waiting for you,
    • And will he waltz me into the sweet
    • Bye and bye down the primrose path
    • And into the wild blue yonder?  What
    • More could a girl ask, I wonder,
    • Than a final whirl into eternal light.
    • 12/29/2013

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: HOW SOON WE FORGET

    HOW SOON WE FORGET

    Rising at dawn to join the long

    Check-in lines, lost baggage,

    Missed connections, luggage

    Seized by porters speaking

    In foreign tongues, on-board

    Plastic snacks, and on arrival

    Montezuma’s upsetting revenge,

    Altitude headaches, the swing

    And sway of undulating waves

    As we lie in our bunks, unsoothed

    By the whining winch and the engine’s drone.

    On shore the cobbled streets

    And unexpected steps slick

    With rain, lintels too low

    To duck and then the cough

    Bestowed by our plane’s tainted

    Air.  All these blessings we vow

    Never to risk again, But then

    The brochures beckon and wea

    Recall the friendships, sunrise

    On seastacks, sunsets on glacial

    Peaks, discovery’s shock of surprise,

    Eye-opening, mind-waking and

    We begin to plan again.

  • RIVERWOODS POEMS: THE CUP

    The loons call out to me, circling below the rim

    (As only loons can swim, proudly and gracefully)

    At the top of the Leishman cup.  I hear their querulous cry

    As I raise the cup to my expectant and willing lips,

    On the perfectly tapered rim from which no drop will fall

    As the curving handle will softly cushion my thumb.

    So does the Potter mold a marriage of utility

    With art in quiet harmony: the clay then turns to gold.