Jack's Knife House

He whittled away A very large branch That in 6,000 days Was part of his ranch Yet not just the branch Or a tree or two He whittled a forest Full, through and through For this man and knife Both aptly named, Jack Had spent half their life Constructing a shack Jack’s knife was quite big With hammer and shovel To both cut and dig A primitive hovel After trees dropped With Jack’s knife axe The bark was lopped To fill in the cracks He whittled five oaks And one hundred pines Yet the pines, no joke Took half the time He sliced up the frame Most days and nights But could not hue stain Nor pare out the lights He whittled a door Out of an ash tree And also the floors Of all rooms, just three The man ate plenty With no need to shop Whittling fish hooks And felling peach crops Then finally old Jack On a day with gloom Completed the shack That lacked head room The rooms were too small For all the hassle Yet, Jack stood tall Beside his castle His wife took a tour But quickly fumed Since there was no sign Of a bathroom But Jack was prepared For his fair spouse Pointing out back to A rough sawn outhouse Still, floors were creaky From lacking nails And ceilings were leaky Details, details So Jack told his wife That his next mission He’ll devote his life On an addition And when they had kids Of at least three They learned to whittle Their own family tree