Reutemann Road Poems – Bev Tappan

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.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: OUR ISABEL

Bev Tappan — Tue, 08 Dec 2015 19:52:36 +0000

OUR ISABEL

We named her Isabel Damaris

For genial Grandma Belle Morgan

And one of the Mayflower daughters

Because she arrived on Thanksgiving,

But Izzy was never called Belle.

She played the French horn and soccer,

Built furniture, threw Raku pots,

Brought up a son with wife Beth,

Computed systems analyses,

And took to the woods in a tent.

She went on to home-groom pets

And cheer-lead her aging mother,

Who gives thanks every year

For Izzy’s affection and zest.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: BRINGING IN THE TREE

Bev Tappan — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 01:50:17 +0000

BRINGING IN THE TREE

Evergreens are prickly about being cut

And carted into houses. Like cat’s fur

They give off sparks that set off

Tempers. Brothers deride

Sisters’ choice of shape and height.

Fathers curse at bulbs

That flicker out. Mothers fuss

At bark and needles on the rug.

But when the final icicle shimmers

Into place and rainbow-colored

Fireflies ignite in darkening branches,

Satisfaction warms the air.

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.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: BABY-SITTING JENNY

Bev Tappan — Sun, 05 Jul 2015 23:38:40 +0000

BABY-SITTING JENNY

We stroll the park, popping snowberries with our fingers

As I did when a child along the shady drive

Of my best friend’s house. We’re pleased to find

Ripe Concord grapes hiding under leaves

That vine the walls she loves to walk on. In the canvas

Swing her small bottom fits my hands

Like a teacup as I lift and send her soaring.

She is old enough to pump herself once

She gets going. We rescue a daring toddler

Who crawled up the slide as a kitten climbs a tree,

Unable to back down. Faster than she expects

Jenny rides the slick steel to a sandy

Landing. She tries it again. We follow pigeons

To the soda stand, and seagulls lead us to the beach

Speckled at low tide with perambulating periwinkles.

They single foot among the Irish moss and sea lettuce

Where clusters of mussels congregate like Portuguese families.

Seven geese drift by in a low-flying convoy

Nattering about the scarcity of minnows. Jenny splashes

Ashore to dump her bucket on a sand patty.

The day is opalescent and fragile as fine crystal

Or the beauties she blows on her soap bubble ring.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: OUR JON

Bev Tappan — Tue, 06 Jan 2015 02:32:30 +0000

OUR JON

Our first born son was tolerant of

His sister, born just fifteen months

His junior, but he teased his younger

Brother, who followed two years later.

And yet, he helped Dan land his first

Big bass, jaws locked on the lure

Of a toy fishing rod, and he took

The punishment for an annoying noise

That Dan, not he, had made. Jon set

A high standard for high school grades

And he got handy with Tandy in time to manage

Data banks before computer classes were taught.

Jon’s first puppy love was Sprite, his beagle,

And later he loved three winsome collies

And Becky, their owner, as well as his tall

Dark-haired daughter, who shares his love

Of all things and customs Japanese:

He critiques animes, practices Shin Buddha

Meditation, savors sakes, sleeps well

On futons, kneels gracefully at tea tables

And wields his chopsticks with skillful ease.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: OUR CHRISTMAS CAROL

Bev Tappan — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 13:44:17 +0000

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.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: FOUR POEMS ON MILLET’S PAINTINGS

Bev Tappan — Mon, 17 Mar 2014 01:57:04 +0000

1. KNITTING LESSON

Skeins of yarn on the window ledge

Shine in a basket, spraying winter

Sunlight onto the rusty, homespun

Jacket and faded denim skirt

Of a full-breasted farm woman

Whose arms encircle a daughter’s shoulders.

Her own half-finished sweater laid

Aside on her lap, she leans to the left,

Chin resting on the smaller bonnet,

Bony hands moving small fingers

In the measured minuet of steel needles.

Scissors gleam faintly on the floor.

2. FARMYARD IN WINTER

A small sun, he glows in the gray morning.

Breast and shoulders gold as the stooks of straw

Bundled in front of his thatched-roof hutch,

Comb and wattle red as the robin perched

On the wall above him, a huddle of hens

In the shadows behind him,

Chaunticleer surveys the snowy yard.

Like oil on water, muted echoes

Of his light whisper from granite stones

And roosting hens while two

Industrious wives peck in the snow

That froths and foams across the straw-

Strewn ground, on tree and fence and wall

And distant roof: cumulous clouds

That outline his dominion.

3. POTATO PLANTERS

They bend in tandem: his hoe

Scoops the hole; her hand lets fall

The seed potatoes. Sunrise

Reddens his vest. Her muddy skirt

Is shadowy green. In the pale

Distance bleached horizon,

Mauve town and chartreuse plain

Recede. A sequence of trees is sunstruck,

Sabots and dirt-streaked pants

Share earth tones with the roughly spaded

Ground. A donkey nods by the baby

Basket-cradled under a live oak.

4. SHEPHERDESSES WATCHING A FLIGHT OF WILD GEESE

Her right arm is bent to shade her eyes

From haze-filtered autumn sunlight

That mutes the gold and coral hedge

And dusts a Biblical patina onto sheep,

Tranquil as gravestones, masticating

Olive grass into smoky wool.

Her left hand, palm down,

Signals her companion to be still and hear

The faint and fading colloquy of tourists

Winging away from winter. Her friend

Leans back on the embankment looking up,

Her child’s face soft with wonder.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: TOWHEES

Bev Tappan — Thu, 07 Nov 2013 00:23:25 +0000

ADAPTING

The towhees keep us company

For a little while along the edge

Of this high ridge road, hopping

Like robins, pecking like hens for bugs

Cocooned on crackling oak leaves

Loosened from snow by slanting midday

Winter sun. We’ve never

Seen them up close before. In summer

They scrabble in shadows, but now

The white painter’s cloth spread out

Over the forest floor

Herds them into the roadside leaves.

They are not ptarmigan, bleaching

Their browns to blend into blank

Surroundings. Towhees make do

With leftover camouflage from autumn.

REUTEMANN ROAD POEMS: ROWING

Bev Tappan — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 03:09:30 +0000

ROWING AT SUNSET

Feathered blades skip over the waves

As I lean back into the westerly wind

That encases and straightens my arrowing scull

Crossing the cove to the river’s bend.

A raftful of cormorants watch me pass,

Rubber necks circling like periscopes.

Awkwardly, I too twist to survey

Over each shoulder the liquid highway

And pause, outrigger oars held flat,

To let a motorboat rocket by

That flushes up the black spectators

Frantically flapping in disarray.

They settle again as sinuous swimmers,

Casually dipping for fishy hors d’oeuvres,

And I resume my water skimming,

The sun as I turn a glory in my eyes.