12 a.m I remove the mask
and take the night.
With open eyes and ears
I take in nights delight.
Second story high,
window shadow puppets stir.
With gestures of fists locked in a loving embrace
to the amateur.
Up above, the whirley-birds
shine their lights.
A perp to peep. A monster to catch.
A search now that’s taken flight.
Smells of diapers
and empty liquor bottles of cope.
Trash lined the streets
where one leaves their dreams and hope.
In the exchange corridor
transactions are being made.
The amount of ones happiness
dependent on the bens being paid.
A late bus appears, leaving one behind
to make her way
To several children left crying. Alone,
to fend through their day.
There’s a kinship to the night
and those who are in it
No judgement from shadows.
No confessions to submit
Just slip away as
dawn makes its way.
Begin the day,
along with its own fray.
THE CROWN JEWELS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Queen Xena, a squirrel, was a female hoarder beyond measure,
for her crown jewels she surely did treasure.
she hid them in the kingdom’s storage locker
along with the fact that she was a punk rocker
The keys and her reputation were safe, safeguarded by her personal dresser.
Then it came to pass, surely you’ll gasp!
Xena’s jewels were lost, away from her claw-like grasp.
“Oh what’s become of my jewels, I’m coming undone.
I’ll find the perpetrator and shoot him with my pea gun.”
“Who’s the perp?” You just had to ask.
Eyewitnesses said, “The thief wore a black mask, was ‘big clawed.
We seen him scampering about the forest and the royal quad.”
At police headquarters, they wrote their statements
Xena filed an insurance claim, believing in suspect’s escapement.
Later texted her friend, the masked racoon. “No one suspects us of insurance fraud.”
In the galaxy called "Milky Way",
there's a planet Earth where people stay.
It's population, eight billion strong,
and they're always right, never wrong;
and each lives by this dictum,
"Never a perp, always a victim".
lost words are wolves hunting
heat from the herd, raw desire
one day less alone
American prom night
youth-swept hair moussed down in place
cigarettes light, poof
there goes Mary's lamb
water pail swings from her jaw
blind to the boil ahead
it begins like a bath
soft as the sun's seduction
quiet as a rack
back window fogs up
fingers paint shapes on car's cave
condensing moments
it was kilning day
he, my substitute art teacher
ersatz guardian
photos of his kids
near the hearth of his grandma's
basement fireplace
I was a student
thirteen is an innocence
despite the heated clay
Sandro knew his kind,
let's call him Terry Carter
because that's his name
My purse got stolen from my car.
It had six or seven pieces of my favorite jewelry in it.
I kept lamenting about it, angry too about the money.
I had taken six hundred dollars to my daughter’s home.
To purchase a crib, but she decided on another one, online.
So, my six hundred dollars was gone too.
I was angry; I could not stop thinking about it.
My favorite diamond infinity ring was in that purse.
For seven weeks hatred came into my heart.
Hatred toward the unknown perpetrator.
Anger that I had lost my favorite ring.
One day I asked God to let me know that someone else loved my ring.
I said “God, if they love it half as much as I did, I will let this go.”
A week later I received a letter from a sheriff in another state.
He said he had my billfold and purse. I had left it with my cane in a McDonald’s.
There was twenty dollars in my purse. Would I want him to send it to me?
He would use the money. I called him and said yes.
I knew why the perp could not go back and claim my purse.
They had left my billfold inside.
I got my infinity ring back.
It was the only piece of jewelry back.
I was a self-admitted misanthrope
unwilling to lose or drop a case.
I often threw a rope-a-dope
just to win; I never lose face.
I worked the dark streets
for dark, and even darker, clients
while the cops walked their beats,
shadows showing giants.
As far as I was concerned,
they were all a bunch of losers.
They were bad; they’d get burned.
The lot were boozers or bruisers.
I had caught a difficult case
The man was stabbed and shot.
He deserved it; he was debase,
but the perp would be caught.
The lawyer was my client,
he was dirty; the worst he could get.
Damn, he was mighty defiant!
Still, I didn’t think he did it.
He had no motive, but also no alibi.
So why were the cops after him?
He was a jerk, but had no reason to lie.
But for him the outlook was grim.
I might have to pummel every john
on the streets to get to the truth.
It wasn’t unpleasing to use my brawn
and I was a hellava good sleuth.
I’d search every city block.
I’d find the filthy little perp.
I’d find the lowlife and knock
the truth out of the twisted twerp!
26 August 2022
Start Sleuthing Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Natasha L Scragg
https://www.rhymezone.com
Verse 1
If you’re going to San Francisco
be sure to let the junkies puke in your hair
If you’re going to San Francisco
you’re gonna meet some homeless people there
Verse 2
For those who come to San Francisco
you’ll see a violent carjackin’ there
In the streets of San Francisco
you’ll see liberal criminals everywhere
Bridge
All across the nation such a strange violation
people in commotion
There’s a whole generation with a new indoctrination
people in commotion, people in commotion
Verse 3
For those who come to San Francisco
be sure to fear some perp pullin’ your hair
If you come to San Francisco
there will be a smash and grab there
Outro
If you come to San Francisco
you might wanna say a prayer
Written: June 2024
In a motel room he blew a man away
A shotgun to the face was the play
He said would it went all wrong
In a drug bust where mercy didn’t belong
That made his reputation not misplaced
Leaving the perp with a bloody mess for a face
They say he wouldn’t get away with it now
He smirked and said it was in the know how
The family wanted him to pay
But the Coroner said the killing was OK
So the lesson to perps was for everyone
If you deal in drugs you will come undone
But what is left when the deed was done
Did he pay for the violence when he won
Or when things were quite in his bed
Was the memory hard to live with the dead.
© Paul Warren Poetry
I hear a cry from the kitchen:
“Who did it? Who’s the perp?
Who dumped down this slime and sludge?
The garbage disposal went burp!”
Contest Name: Your Best Quatrain
Sponsor: L. Milton Hankins
There were three reliable eye witnesses to the robbery.
I was the first detective on the scene;
did not even have time to put on my overcoat.
One said the perpetrator was young, blonde, five nine, thin.
Another said he was dark-skinned, thirty-five-ish, stocky, with green eyes.
A third said he was not sure if the perp was a woman or a man.
I gave this guy a business card to my other business.
When I am not solving crime from my easy chair, I sell eyeglasses.
soulless patch o’er socket
his trusty parrot on shoulder
red and green molting hues falling
a dead shot hole, smoking
perp impaled by the pirate’s hook
5/16/2019
68868LIND Form
Not for contest
Cecilia’s silliest cause:
To vandalize parks for guffaws.
The cops quickly caught her
When Bob Brickley’s daughter
Saw saucy Cece saw seesaws.
We are armchair detectives
My husband and I
Yelling “lawyer!”
When they put the suspect
In an interrogation room, on TV
We are no longer amazed when the perp turns into an automatic motor mouth
Even though he was a tough guy a few seconds before, refusing to talk.
We yell out who we think did it in a
Competitive way, getting excited toward the end
Right before the perpetrator is revealed.
Shaking our heads, feeling superior, safe in the confines of
Our Lazy Boys, we have become forensic experts.
My husband is always amazed when my guesses are correct
It is not that I am that smart, it is that I guess
Everybody
In a half hour, I have yelled out every single person’s name
On the show
Covering all my bases.
Why he pretends to never catch on is anyone’s guess.
Either he has never figured it out
Or he does not care.
Meaning we might stay married another forty-seven years.
On a high school track there has been found
Some human feces on the ground
And more than once had Nature called;
A camera therefore was installed.
Was it a prank or would it show
A jogger who just had to go?
The fact that it was left to find
Implied there was an axe to grind.
Today the perp at last was caught
And everybody was distraught.
It was no kid who had a grudge
But the district head who they must judge.
His reasons haven't been revealed
For leaving poo out on that field,
But I would guess as of today
That he has flushed his job away.
A town in Georgia had a rash
Of crimes; the perp was bold and brash,
Destroying mirrors on the side
That automakers do provide.
The cops assumed that it was teens
‘Cause pranks are part of teenage genes
Until a neighbor strolling by
The mirror-basher did espy.
It wasn’t kids, but what occurred
Was vicious pecking by a bird
Who likely thought, as theories go,
His mirror image was his foe.
It goes to show, don’t jump the gun
Accusing teens or anyone.
When mirrors somehow end up wrecked,
That perp might just be one who pecked.
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