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Best Poems Written by David Crandall

Below are the all-time best David Crandall poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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The Marvelous Platypus

The platypus excels at evolution
And displays a super cool solution
For making his way amidst the muck, 
He don't run aground.  He don't get stuck.
Of this, the platypus would never dream
As a self-respecting monotreme.
Indeed, a platypus of station
Will employ electrolocation.

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Colors of Love

The sun shone and our love was born.
Your golden hair, it did adorn.
Green was the grass, and too, your eyes,
that flicked and danced like butterflies - 
the day our love was born.

The sky above was sapphire blue, 
It was endless.  Our love was too.
Rose flushed your cheeks, and red your lips,   
as our souls, like our fingertips, 
touched, intertwined and flew.

Must everything, once born, then die?
and colorless tears fall as we cry?  
Must our love story fade to black?
Is there no chance to get it back?
Can we give it one more try?

Details | David Crandall Poem

Temporary Insanity

Afternoon musing, not quite content,
Wondering where the time all went -
The time not really given, only lent.

The first day of fourth grade,
In the next desk a new girl stayed,
With honey colored hair all in a braid.

It would not be easy to concentrate.
How could a teacher educate 
A boy so close to a pretty schoolmate?

Boys and girls about us knocked,
While we two, on the blacktop walked -
Of explorers seeking gold we talked.

I was only up to a grasshopper’s knee
And already sick with temporary insanity.

But in the blink of an eye, time unfroze,
And as fast as I grew into a new set of clothes,
I forgot that sweet girl by the school year’s close.

Into our sixth grade class, a new girl flew. 
In the wind, this tomboy’s long hair blew.
Like the sun in the sky, her smile shone true.

I dreamed of her both day and night
And contrived where I might of her catch sight - 
And so upward soared my heart like a kite.

It’s good that it did not hit a tree,
As I came down again from temporary insanity.

Time passes so quickly, it cannot delay
The tasks on fate’s calendar, which it must obey,
So I forgot her bright smile, in a swift summer day.

In Spanish class, fifteen years of age,
One day I looked up from the page,
With her laughing eyes I did engage -
And, so, for the first time, a girl I’d touch.
You couldn’t say, I did not like it much.
The feeling was otherworldly, such.

Next thing I knew, my heart took a leap,
But it fell into a hole so deep.
From it, it took some time to creep.

I’m sure that you will all agree,
It was a bad case of temporary insanity.

Unthinkable though it may be,
That young girl would not hear my plea. 
It was I who was forgot, not she.

My life would continue to unfold,
Like a sculptor, my life’s features fate would mold -
She doesn’t like a story, unshaped, untold. 

Ten years later, I would find
A brown-eyed treasure, God designed.
To love each other, we were inclined.

I was twenty-five and she nineteen.
She was a gift from heaven - unforeseen.
We’d go everywhere and back and in-between.

At least that was to be the plan,
Based on the way our story began.
To pass up this chance, I’d be a crazy man.

One day, on a bench in a mall I sat.
Joining me was an old lady that
Sat silently too.  We did not chat.

My sweetheart popped out from a store with a smile,
Proudly showing me shoes in the latest style.
She went back in, the old lady smiled: “keep her” (not just a while).

My heart confirmed the words of the lady grey,
But “be my wife”, I was afraid to say.
Was she the one that got away?

Maybe the day I set her free
Was my worst case of temporary insanity.

Once in a while in a memory so strong,
I hear her singing me a Christmas song.
Forty years later, and I now sing along.

Yes, despite the passing of many a moon,
Sometimes I still hear that tune -
No, time does not make me immune.

And now, to cut this story short,
Similar nonsense, I’ll not report.
Twice, the endings were in court.

A better man might look deeper than me,
And see more than just temporary insanity.

At least one thing time can’t destroy - 
The immutable everlasting joy
Which began the day I was blessed with a boy.

I guess love makes the world go around.
Every boy and girl with gratitude must be bound,
Their existence owed to minds unsound.

But now, I think that I am finally free,
With over four years of sobriety,
From the dreaded scourge of temporary insanity. 

Now afternoon has gone to night.
My thoughts do my dreams incite.
And they are quite a fright.

I cannot tell if it’s long ago past,
Or if it’s more of a future forecast,
Or a repeat, many times amassed.

It might be that I’m at St. Peter’s gate,
Or maybe hoping to reincarnate, 
And the judge will soon decide my fate.

“Show me mercy, I know I’ve done bad.
Must your rules of judgment be ironclad?
It was temporary insanity I had”.

“That’s a sentence, not a plea.
You’ll serve a lifetime of temporary insanity.”

Details | David Crandall Poem

Three Sides to Every Story

My lifetime friend, I feel so odd.
I'm not insured for acts of God.
Everything, it seems, is lost or gone.
I can't feel the ground I stand upon.

Today, we oldsters sat down to look
inside your yellow paged scrapbook.
I saw a picture and letter there.
I was frozen and could only stare.  

You, I'm sure, didn't want me to see
the familiar face that gazed at me.
Of course, it was my only wife,
the only true love of my life.

Love's sad lesson learned in one day, 
I'll see myself to the door, okay?
I thought stories had two sides, you see,
but triangles all have three.

Details | David Crandall Poem

The Duckling - Apologies to Edgar Allan Poe

Warning - Don't read The Raven and Watch Hitchcock on the same night. 

Once before my bedtime, nearing, which I dreaded, fazed and fearing,  
Stories mother would read me before she closed and locked my bedroom door —
    While I washed up in the water, could mom have drawn it any hotter?
Before me swam a rubber duckling, chuckling as my mother shut the door 
“‘Tis some water fowl”, I muttered, “which mother bought me from the store.  
            Only this and nothing more.”

 Ah, distinctly I can place it - the sad night Mother would misplace it;   
Or entirely erase it; of her mind remaining nothing more.
    I lay in bed, mother tucking, on feathers of mother’s plucking
    Time for your book, said mother clucking, clucking as she locked the bedroom door —
I’ll read “Make Way for Ducklings” and then warm milk she began to pour -
            all across the bedroom floor. 

Assuredly, I felt no sorrow, as mother left me till the morrow
  Sighing -  buying time – which maybe I could only hope to borrow;
    I heard my monstrous mother screaming, or maybe Tippi Hedren streaming
    as Hitchcock’s “Birds” was beaming from the TV laying on the floor—
    “’Tis just Hitchcock’s “Birds” beaming from the TV laying on the floor” -
            This it is and nothing more.”

Inside that book peered at me smiling, a crazed duck that set me dialing
 911 and protective services to frantically implore  
   The feeling in my stomach sinking, “I need a friend”, I was thinking 
   Staring wildly at this ghastly mallard who chilled me to the core
Then, at once, I saw it, heard it, this grinning duck needn’t chill me to the core
           as he said, “I will be your friend forevermore”.

Details | David Crandall Poem

Bakery

bak'ry
sweet panoply
pick a number and wait
anticipation, sal'vation
heaven

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Dadella DeVil

(To be sung to the tune of "Cruella DeVil from Disney's 101 Dalmations)

Dadella DeVil, Dadella DeVil
If he don't make you laugh, no funny thing will
I think of him, and now I'm laughing still
Dadella, Dadella
You'll wait for him to come home from work until 
You see your Dadella DeVil
 
At first you think Dadella's kind of nutty
He might pick you and to twirl you aroun'
But just when you think, for him you are quite ready
He'll change it up and turn you upside down 

This crazy man, this lighthearted guy
I'll never forget him to the day I die
When Dad came home, it sure gave me a thrill
Dadella, Dadella DeVil

Details | David Crandall Poem

Cheep!

I speak to you of wonderful trees
and of butterflies and bees...Cheep!

Who let this bird into my poem?
Catch him, and to the door, let's show 'im...Cheep!

Until we control the situation, 
I cannot continue my recitation...Cheep!

Nervous twitching, restless mumbling,
an audience to a performance humbling...Cheep!

All because the poet forgot one word.
He said bee and butterfly, but not bird...Cheep!

Details | David Crandall Poem

A Cup of Tea

The cars drive by in ones, twos, and threes.
Leaves gently flutter in the cool breeze.
I look to the street, then down, then up.
A sense of unease, I sip from my cup.

Outside folks walking slow and quick.
The watch on my wrist starts to loudly tick.
Inside the eyes seem to fall on me.
I drink and wonder where she could be.

I feel as though I’d like to hide
A secret - not to the world confide.
From my teacup, I take a drink
As my silly heart begins to sink.

And now from behind a barricade -
An unstoppable, rushing cascade -
The masquerade ends.  I gulp my tea,
And I can’t escape, but it is me. 

By a familiar feeling now I’m haunted -
That, alas, I am still unwanted.
Whoever she is, she never shows up.
But, I take wisdom from my teacup.

What I’ve got here with every fault
Is better than nothing by default.
It’s better than insincerity and fluff.
Myself and tea are quite enough.

Details | David Crandall Poem

Between the Lines

I sought the words for you, my lovely dear, 
to live in lines of melodious hue,
especially chosen for eye and ear,
in hopes they’d ring so glorious, so true.

I fear, my love, such words do not exist.
These truths reside outside the realm of words.
Instead, these tender feelings do persist  
between the lines, or in the songs of birds.    

In life, as in verse, does meaning not lie 
outside visible lines of daily life
where things that matter do not meet the eye?
So, let’s pierce these lines with the sharpest knife.

In the space betwixt when my heart will beat, 
someday, somewhere, between the lines we’ll meet.