Bayfield Poet Laureate 2017–2019
Scroll through the newspaper article about our first poet laureate below:
The Big Oak on Second Street (Heritage Tree - 2016)
Today we stand beneath this towering giant
With awe filled children's eyes,
An oak so old, yet still so young,
Its strong arms reaching for the skies.
We honor ye, this ancient tree,
At home on Second Street.
Why pay homage to a tree?
These old red bricks a blanket at its feet.
These giant oaks may dot our land
With hungry mouths pressed to earth,
But none can claim our hearts as thee,
This our Red Oak, so wide of girth.
Oak trees may come and go,
But ours still standing tall.
This the tree the young Boutins did climb,
And sometimes from it fall.
Just up from Meyers Barn it was,
Where horses stayed to rest and eat.
This tree, for years and years,
The big red oak up on Second Street.
What have such trees seen,
What have they felt and known
As saplings in the sun
Where ancient pines had grown?
'Twas a time when money had us on the move,
When folly romped so loud and free,
Soon forest and fish were gone, the brownstone passé,
Oh, to stand our ground like thee.
Howard Paap, 2016
Bayfield
Do you live here, they ask, a longing for fulfillment
in their anxious eyes.
I mean year-round, in the winter too
with all it's snow?
Do you see the lake each day
in the creamy moonlight as well?
Do you walk the length of Rittenhouse,
Manypenny, Washington and Rice,
A venues with names from
the storied long ago?
What's it like day in and day out
to live by this lake
To know the morning's promise
to feel its cold even on a summer's day?
What's it like to live in a place
you love with your whole heart
To watch your children frolic in the shallows building castles in this cool, pure air?
Howard Paap, 2017
Gichigami
Daily we rise
To see you before us
Awed by your presence,
Your silent chorus.
No thought, no call demands us
To turn our heads your way,
But pause we must
At the start of our day.
We stand, and peer,
No human can compare.
Your silent indifference
Filling us as we stare
What it is you hold
Deep inside all being
The mystery of this life
Heard, touched, and seen
Through the day, a glance,
You remain, even when out of sight,
We, pulled away by convention,
Ever mindful of your might.
At dusk when work is done
Our tools put down,
We turn our eyes your way again
In your silence to drown.
To sleep we slip, at peace to rest
A gently falling wave,
In mom to rise, to gaze your way
Our thanks for what you gave.
To pull our eyes
To you, oh silent friend.
Standing with us, night and day
From early start to very end.
Howard Paap, 2017
Tough Like a Tansy
To be like the tansy
That wild cousin of the aster
The yellow button flower
In the ditches, by the pasture.
It's species, vulgare
Meaning the raw and uncouth
Undesired, a nuisance
Like a nagging wisdom tooth.
Invasive they say
A stranger to our shore
Eager to spread
So tough at its core.
Not advised to be picked
For the table's flower vase
Lest it gain a foothold
Wins purchase out of place.
Flaunting its strength
As we hurry on by
Its indifference so strong
Defiant, not shy.
No matter it says
That flower seekers ignore it
The tansy will prevail
'cause others adore it.
Howard Paap, 2017
Choice Eternal
A woodland trail
Up and o'er the hill
We, with little time,
Few moments to kill.
Still, the path leads on,
Eternally calling.
While the hour glass,
It's tiny grains falling.
Yes, we dallied,
Our pleasure to please.
To savor our love,
Our passion appease.
Now late, alas,
We must choose
To the village, its hearth, return
Or the path peruse.
What price, this,
We humans pay.
To risk the summit,
Or in the village stay.
'Ere the beginning,
This choice we face.
The trail or the hearth,
A question of place.
Howard Paap, 2017
Gichigami
Daily we rise
To see you before us
Awed by your presence,
Your silent chorus.
No thought, no call demands us
To turn our heads your way,
But pause we must
At the start of our day.
We stand, and peer,
No human can compare.
Your silent indifference
Filling us as we stare
What it is you hold
Deep inside all being
The mystery of this life
Heard, touched, and seen
Through the day, a glance,
You remain, even when out of sight,
We, pulled away by convention,
Ever mindful of your might.
At dusk when work is done
Our tools put down,
We tum our eyes your way again
In your silence to drown.
To sleep we slip, at peace to rest
A gently falling wave,
In morn to rise, to gaze your way
Our thanks for what you gave.
To pull our eyes
To you, oh silent friend.
Standing with us, night and day
From early start to very end.
Howard Paap, 2018