Card Play Poem by Nancy Ames

He bluffed his way to a win at the tables,
gathered in his money, flexed his muscles,
and went upstairs to her room.

With a winning smile, he opened her door,
with losers like hounds on his trail. He kicked
the door shut in all their barking loser faces
and pulled down his pants. He was wearing
purple tights.

Big round coins fell out of his pockets onto
the thickness of her carpets.

She laughed her lilting laugh and got out of
the bed, waved a big gun at him and tossed
him his crown.

She opened the window to the fire escape.
He frowned and pulled up his pants and they
fled the scene.

The next day some guy took one of the coins
to the cops and tried to get them to check it
for fingerprints, so he must be the joker, huh?