let me tell you a thing or two about ohio jack
jack was a guy who knew the way to market and back
and if it were true he couldn’t tell ya exactly what a cow’s worth
he knew full well what a bean could do if you stamped it in the earth
so when his ma finally lost it & tossed it in the garden
Jack didn’t waste time with a sorry ma’am, beggin yer parden
he jes’ lay a’bed all day, tuggin’ on a bottle o’bourbon
making spooky goosey shapes with his hands upon the curtain
and when the moon had finally risen, nice n’ full n’ round
he staggered out onto the porch n’seen a beanstalk in the ground
about where them ol’ beans’d got chucked, so high there weren’t no end to it
straight n’wide as a turnpike ride, without a single bend to it
so he took a sack, a coil a’rope, n’ wha’ d’he say? A axe?
put the rope in the sack, the axe in his belt, and slung the sack on his back
& he started there a’climbin’ – and he climbed & climbed all night
a thousand feet or more, till he climbed clean outta sight
up into this fairyland, with a cloudy kinda spring to it
an a castle with a goose, an a harp that plucked itself when he sing’d to it
well – Jack bein’ Jack, a man o’renown, he didn’t need no second telling
he stuffed the goose n’ the harp in his sack, the harp a’bitchin’ and a’yellin’
enough to wake the giant buckeye what owned that piece o’real estate
and he chased young Jack with the bulging sack clean out the castle gate
an’ they ran like that, Jack swearin’ and a sweatin’, the giant mean as a hawk
till Jack saw a leaf poking up thru’ the cloud and he knew he’d reached the stalk
Jack hurried down, hand over boots, the giant close behind
with nothing but a fire of hate to his face and a twist of revenge to his mind
but Jack landed first, he turned with his axe
and he cut through that plant in a coupla whacks
and the giant crashed down in one trailin’, pitchin’ ladder of plant
and lay there dead as anything, deader than Ulysses S. Grant
turned out the goose Jack took was worth considerable more than a parrot
lay medium sized eggs of pretty fine gold, if not twenty-four carat
so Jack and his mum were fixed for life, of that there weren’t no question
and the giant was left to rot where he fell, quite the tourist attraction
so let this be a lesson to ya – quite what, I ain’t too sure
even yer’ cloud-based buckeye needs a decent lock for the door
Reblogged this on Finding God Together and commented:
I enjoy reading his poems every day. Thought maybe you would too!
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That is so kind of you, Katie! I’m glad you like the poems 🙂
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