Poetry and Creative Writing for All

David Whitney

HANDSOME JACK

I tried to be a better man, a leader of the pack
I dealt my cards with utmost care, my name was Handsome Jack
I had this reputation of a man who broke girl’s hearts
I showered them with diamonds and that’s where my trouble start’s
I wanted to be King of Kings and shuffle off my debts
I gambled with my poker face and lost so many bets
My women, Queens of conscience, all were lost along the way
They couldn’t cope with all my games and didn’t want to play
So winning some and losing  most no longer was I Ace
And people called me Jack the Lad but never to my face
I stole from many loved ones and I squandered in the Club’s
I smoked some dope without a hope in many seedy pubs
A Joker now without a joke, a man without a heart
I hit the deck with much regret, my eyes began to smart
I saw my life in flash-back all my cards spread on the table
My lids shut still, no longer ill
There end’s my sorry Fable.

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LOOKING FOR RAINBOWS

I just can’t explain how I’m feeling
I can’t seem to make myself clear
It’s like my whole world’s stopped revolving
Now my mother is no longer here
I try to pretend things are normal
Though the mask that I wear tends to slip
For a moment of time I’m in mourning
And it’s then that I can’t take a grip
If only I had the assurance
That my mother’s O.K. where she’s gone
I wouldn’t need all this emotion
And the mask wouldn’t have to go on
It’s like a bad dream that’s repeating
With too many demons in chase
And there’s no point in looking for rainbows
To encourage a smile on my face
I’d just love a message from mother
From the phone booth in “Heaven’s Arcade”
Just to tell me she’s blissfully happy
With my dad in the new life she’s made
Or to feel loving arms circling round me
Or to capture her kiss in the air
Would be more than enough to convince me
That my mother’s eternally there
But till then I go on very slowly
With a burden of questions and doubt
It’s a life in a maze of confusion
And I can’t find the door to get out
But I know in the end I’ll accept things
It’s the way of the world and in time
I know that I’ll find all the answers
And there will be a reason and rhyme
Until then I keep praying and pleading
With the trust I’ve been prompted to hold
And her love to sustain and remind me
Of my fortune of memories Gold

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APPE-TIGHT

Bessie was enormous almost twenty eight stone four
She bought a house in Cheadle but could not get through the door
She had the doorway widened then she gained another stone
And she got herself stuck through it but she’d got her mobile phone
But she didn’t ring the fire brigade
She rang “Wong Choo’s Chinese” and she ordered sweet and sour pork together with Lychees
The take-away was ages so she rang the
The Pizza Place
She  wasn’t scared of being stuck
She had to feed her face
Three giant pizzas later and the Chinese food appeared
By then she was securely stuck and almost door veneered
She tried to make another call but found her battery dead
So there was nothing else that she could do
But scream for help instead
She hollered like a banshee and at last somebody heard
He tried his best to move her but the task was just absurd
He went and got a fork lift truck and tried
His utter best
But Bessie didn’t budge an inch but that you must have guessed
So there she was and there she died stuck for the world to see
It was easier to leave her there next to the cemetery
Her epitaph was very apt inscribed above her head
“I’m fat because I’m greedy but I’m thin now that I’m Dead”

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NOW THE LOVING STARTS

A soft soft kiss
Two hearts flutter in time
Hands clasp together
Eyes fast shut
Temptations climb
Legs weak tremble
Like draughty candle flames
Passion paints a canvas
Full of forbidden games
And clothes cast crumple
On mosaic tiles
Arms embrace 
The touch of naked skin
Lips part in glistening smiles
Tangled limbs entwine
And breath beats heavy drum
To summon your desire
Whispered moans and gasps
Caught in the night quench
But still burns the fire
Curtains silk and floating
On a warm breeze
Waft sweet the incense smoking near
Arms flay in lost abandon
Sighs and cries expose a tear
Moonbeams light the flesh
And loins dance
Erotic shadows on the wall
Heavy breathing fills the air with rapture
Bodies rise and fall
The end comes ready waiting sleep
The prize of tired hearts
Lust forgotten in a moment’s madness
Now the loving starts

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SURVIVING THE DREAMS

The face cream in pounds costs four hundred and five
Enough to keep many poor children alive
The diamond cost more than the life of a town
Its glittering facets pale next to a frown
And beggars keep begging whilst footballer’s score
The poor getting poorer the rich getting more
And children hold hands out for pity and rice
While others buy gold and don’t look at the price
What kind of a place is this world full of greed
Where people ignore all the people who need
Two thousand and six and we still cannot see
That there’s plenty for you and there’s plenty for me
It doesn’t take science it only takes sense
To share with each other the pounds and the pence
Who need’s so much money and fanciful cars
Sort the world out down here before looking at Mars
How can people sleep nights not having a care
When poverty breed’s everyday everywhere
The Gucci look’s great with a price tag to match
Some people have wealth in the germ’s that they catch
But nobody thinks when they’re spending on jewels
They feed their desires like obscenities ghouls
And so it goes on and the poor die alone
No car no T.V. and without mobile phone
I shudder to think what God makes of us guys
He must be disgusted with tears in his eyes
A world full of beauty turned ugly and lost
Where celebrity has no regard for the cost
With your head in the sand all’s as well as it seems
But there’s people so poor they’re surviving on dreams
The mansion may have many rooms shining bright
But there’s some who don’t have a warm bed for the night
I fear it’s too late for the world to awake
All I hope in the end God forgives our mistake.

The End

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Submission Guidelines: Poems of no more than 30 lines in length each will be considered.