Ellen Schmidt Open Mike, August 29, 2022

• hosted by Dan Tappan
  Mount Washington Poems
• Repairing the Cairns
• A Mountaintop Experience

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike – April 4, 2022

• hosted by Dan Tappan
• Timing is Everything
• A Backward Glance

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike – March 21, 2022

• hosted by Dan Tappan
• The Trail Not Taken (with Apology to Robert Frost)
• A Reminder

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike – March 7, 2022

• hosted by Dan Tappan
• The Kancamagus Hike
• The Last Day of March

Ellen Schmidt Open Mike on February 7, 2022

• hosted by Dan Tappan
• Winter Backpack

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

The lambent sun burnishes Cannon’s cliffs

As we draw near Franconia Notch and then

The rock slide screes are sparkling as if

A Titan’s eyes are focusing on them.

Past the verdant vacant ski slopes, Echo

Lake, the “Old Man-Reimagined” park,

Over the top of the notch we gladly go

To reach our destination before dark.

Would that all our trails might emerge into light

And not be dangerous or fraught with gloom.

Let all our journeys be to mountain heights

Ever toward the heavens, not the tombs.

Then might our little lives be richly blessed

Unfettered by fear and warmed with happiness.

The storm descended from the north

Across the Presidential peaks,

A dense envelopment of fog.

Who knew what havoc it might wreck?

Small leaves at first began to shake.

Then tall trees bent and slowly swayed.

A thick mist swallowed every shape.

The rain came down in a raging cascade.

This storm by Zeus’s fist was hurled

But its tumult soon did pass us by.

A rainbow over the glen unfurled

And blue bits did return to the sky.

Some miles to the south another town

Was caught in the fury our vale was spared.

Trees were uprooted and power was lost.

For their well-being no deity cared.

But we for whom the rainbow shone

Know that their fate could have been our own.

The wintry wind whipped at our cheeks

Teared our eyes and misted our glasses.

Before the end of the driveway we meekly

Turned in submission to its lashes.

It’s no day to venture onto the slopes:

Lifts won’t run be running in these blasts.

So much for our high school senior’s hopes

Of trying the Notch’s challenge at last.

Instead we head for the nearest mall

Load up on soda, popcorn and nachos

And find a film agreeable to all

Where the weather is less ferocious.

Sometimes it’s better not to try

Against all odds to do or die.

]]> https://bevtappan.net/2017/03/13/riverwoods-poems-choices/feed/ 1 1812 https://bevtappan.net/2016/10/22/tamworth-poems-white-mountain-art/ https://bevtappan.net/2016/10/22/tamworth-poems-white-mountain-art/#respond Sat, 22 Oct 2016 09:40:54 +0000 https://bevpoems.wordpress.com/?p=1605 WHITE MOUNTAIN ART

The artists stayed in grand hotels

Leaving in payment for their keep

Saleable oils or watercolors

Where light flickers through lacy leaves

Bounces off rocks and sheep or cows

Gleams on waterfalls and soars

All unconfined to the mountaintops.

Always something catches the eye

In the foreground – a red coat or a dog.

The trees are finely drawn and shadowed.

You can tell weather by the clouds

In skies of varied blues and grays.

These pictures are easy to live with.

Small as postcards or too big to hang

On parlor walls, they hide themselves

Murky with dust in farmhouse auctions.

Today we point the lens at the mountain:

Snow flocks the firs on high ridges.

The alabaster peaks are carved

Chrystal sharp by the cold blue air.

Among the hardwoods a smoldering fire

Of fall foliage lingers – beech,

Birch and the last of the sugar maples.

Catching the eye in the foreground, framed

By telephone poles, lettered in gold

Is the sign of the Up Country Saloon.

For all you leaf peepers who know

To come up to the Whites in October,

You may be too late for the show.

Our maples are reddening early.

Leaves and needles are brown.

It is only late September, but

We are suffering from a drought.

Some branches are already bare.

By the time most of you get here,

We may have no vistas to share.

Is this the promise of the future?

Has the time come to mourn the maples?

That is a most depressing picture,

And for spring sugaring it bodes ill.