Cape Cod Poetry: A testament to the beauty of Cape Cod
With October come and nearly gone, the autumnal beauty overtaking Cape Cod is hard to deny.
The leaves are shades of yellow, orange and red. The air is beginning to get a slight bitter chill and preparations for winter are starting. In our October poems, we relish in the beauty of the "bared and bended arm of Massachusetts," as Henry David Thoreau said, appreciating the natural wonders this stretch of land has to offer.
Captured in the poems below is a true testament to what makes Cape Cod so wonderful. If you ever find yourself penning a line or two or if writing poetry is an act you hold dear, consider submitting your work to our poetry contest. Each month, a panel of professional poets judges our Cape Cod Poetry contest, and a few winners get to see their work published in the paper. More information on how to submit is below.
Helen Bowdoin, a former occupational therapist, left her life in the office to join the Walden Woods Project to design and direct its educational programming. Now, with years of retirement under her belt, Bowdoin remains active in local land conservation efforts. Her love for writing began with a two-sentence competition about her cocker spaniel in the first grade.
When asked what inspired “Eastham Meetings,” Bowdoin wrote, “As part of Cape Cod's National Seashore Park, The Fort Hill Trail is a memorable walk in any season. An October walk many years ago inspired ‘Eastham Meetings.’ The dramatic contrast between the peaceful fields followed by the raging Atlantic seemed almost to be asking for a poem. I was with a close friend when we walked it together, and he later claimed to be the muse who inspired it. I think he was right.”
Eastham Meetings
By Helen Bowdoin
Walk with me, won’t you
to the field all mowed,
its fresh green crest curving
up to lie along October’s blue.
A sleek and sweeping touch
of grass to sky.
Then on to the old field’s
tangle of greens and browns,
long grasses shot through
with stalks of Queen Anne’s lace
and goldenrod gone by,
draped with scarlet loopings of Virginia creeper.
Salt marsh and sea come next,
high tide running up to greet
and rinse a gentler sea
of bowing grasses, gilded
twice by autumn and this
afternoon’s slant of sun.
A great blue heron watches here.
Come out at last to the overlook,
to the heaving Atlantic charging in
and crashing today, crashing
down on Nauset’s barrier beach,
spray, foam, froth all flying
racing in to beat the quartz sand —
roaring mad at winning.
Look north, look south and
where’s a meeting any bigger?
Your hand in mine now,
we’re turning round, turning
toward that smooth silent touch
of grass to sky ― breathtaking really
just back through the fields.
Walk with me, will you?
***
Bernadette Waystack is an artist and educator based in Harwich Port whose work investigates the concepts of landscape as memory.
Inspiration: I was Artist in Residence on Star Island off the coast of Portsmouth New Hampshire in 2022. I was determined to work outside on location. But I’ll need a lot more practice as every time I attempt it, it’s a comedy of errors, never as idyllic as it seems. The painting I did came out well despite it all.
To Paint Plein Air
By Bernadette Waystack
I wanted to paint plein air
Like an Impressionist master
Chasing the light
In the sparkling air
Daubing my canvas with prismatic hues
Of cerulean and emerald and gold
Creating a “knockout.”
I ended up painting outside
Like a struggling first-year art student
Chasing my paper towels
In fierce winds
Wrestling my canvas
Back on the easel
with splotches of mud
Making a mess.
***
A retired nurse, Margaret Dunn saw nursing as an art and a science. She is a self-claimed “lifelong learner” and spends her time reading, listening to podcasts, watching the Metropolitan Opera on Metopera HD and watching online art history seminars. Originally from Long Island, where she still lives, Dunn spent her vacations in Truro.
On writing “Pamet Harbor,” Dunn wrote, “Poetry provides me images and feelings to feed my soul. I can smell the salt air, hear the waves and be transported. My father would go to the Pamet and rake for sand eels. One year the train and trestle were gone. I wrote this to capture that past time. I am influenced by Mary Oliver.”
Pamet Harbor
By Margaret Dunn
The kingfisher watches
From atop the remains
Of a trestle piling
Suddenly plunging headlong
Into the flowing water
Of the outgoing tide
Rewarded with a silvery sand eel
He returns to his perch
Balancing carefully as a long
Ago train rumbles overhead.
***
A part-time Truro resident and California native, Janice Ericson has been a poet for some time. She joined Tom Daley’s poetry workshops in 2009 and has been a member ever since. Her work has been published in The Ekphrastic Review and The Avocet. Ericson considers herself to be a nature poet.
Her inspiration for “The Great Horned Owl” came from a great horned owl that lived in the woods by her home in Truro “with its enchanting and familiar ‘who’ call.”
The Great Horned Owl
By Janice Ericson
The soft alto spreads like a sea mist in the canopy
fingering the reaches of her domain.
Mesmerized by the sole sound in the still trees,
we concede her kingdom and darken our lanterns.
***
A “lifelong ponderer,” Ginny Dolan uses poetry as a tool to help put life into perspective in our ever-changing world. Through poetry classes at Cape Cod Community College, Dolan became compelled to share her inner thoughts yet still is surprised by where the words lead her. Dolan is grateful for her family, friends and local poet community’s encouragement and finds the process of expression meditative.
“Ed Meek’s poem ‘In Memory Of’ the Times reposted inspired me to research the person benches were dedicated to in Wellfleet. A beautiful tribute by her family that also sponsored supplies for window boxes at the marina for all to enjoy. The misread of cordial for colorful flowers brought about this poem of embracing diversity and sameness in our shared humanity.”
Cordial Perennial Flowers
By Ginny Dolan
Enlightening misread of colorful perennial flowers
window-box clustered,
variety and uniqueness united
powerful in combination,
playing well in their contained sandbox
sharing individual beauty together,
roots drawing upon same aquifer
crowns empowered by shared light,
joint energy conversion from air
supplying individual growth,
collaboration stunningly displayed
unaware of strengthful presentation.
How to enter the Cape Cod Times Poetry Contest
Cape Cod Times monthly poetry contest needs your poems to stay vital. We thank our volunteer judges and coordinator.
Here’s how to send us your work:
Submit one poem single-spaced, of 35 lines or fewer per month.
Poems cannot be previously published (in print or online).
Deadline for the next submission is Nov. 1, 2023.
Submit by email to cctpoetry12@gmail.com.
Poems should be free of hate speech and expletives (profanity, vulgarity, obscenity).
In the body of the e-mail, send your contact information: name, address, phone number and title of poem; then, in a Word Doc attachment, include poem without your name or any other personal info, so that the poem can be judged anonymously.
Editor's note: This story was changed Oct. 30 to correct the spelling of Helen Bowdoin's name and to correct the inspiration for Bernadette Waystack's poem.
This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Cape Cod Poetry highlights the natural wonders of Cape Cod
