Poetry competition winning entries - 3rd place

A Modern day Ruth Pierce story

 

It was in the Winter long ago

When on the ground around lay snow

The 3 friends off to the garden centre went

To buy a tree to replace one that had been bent

 

In half by the horrible weather

So the friends got on the bus together

To make the journey into town

To replace that tree that had fallen down

 

When they arrived the trees were all bare

Not a good time to buy plants there

As the branches were without leaves

A lack of foliage deceives

 

So instead they looked for indoor plants

For their apartment to enhance

And alighted on a massive yucca

And all decided it looked 'Pukka!'

 

£60 seemed a good price

For a plant that looked very nice

John said it was within their reach

To contribute £20 each

 

Ben agreed and gazed in awe

But doubting Ruth wasn't so sure

As she wanted her money for another plan

Involving crime to be with her man

 

She hummed and hah'd saying she was poor

When really Ruth had much more

Than the chaps with whom she shared

The apartment, the place where'd

 

They all lived together happily at one time

But Ruth was now leading a life of crime

By hacking people's bank accounts

She'd earned really big amounts

 

Of money that simply wasn't hers

Stolen to fund a life with Olly Murs

As she and Olly loved to sing and dance

And were planning a new life away in France

 

For Olly had fallen on hard times

His songs were running out of rhymes

So the couple who'd become lovers

Paid their bills by scamming others

 

Fraud was their little game,

Nothing more than theft in name

Of scamming poor innocent folk

Olly's career had become a joke

 

They took the yucca to the till

And claimed they'd paid the bill

But when they were £20 short

Ruth claimed that she had thought

 

That she'd paid her fair share

Out to the other pair

But they were left in disbelief

Thinking that Ruth was a common thief

 

So the boys both paid £30

To buy the yucca that was on the ground

Disgusted with Ruth's deceit

While she looked glumly at her feet

 

Off to the car they took their plant

Enduring Ruth's vicious rant

Of how she'd really got no money

Which the boys thought was 'really funny'

 

Ruth wasn't looking where she was traversing

And was hit by a lorry that was reversing

The truck was faulty, reverse not beeping

And Ruth was walking as if sleeping

 

Killed outright was Ruth on the ground laying

By a vehicle whose radio was playing

An Olly song called 'Troublemaker'

Ruth now heading to the undertaker

 

Poetic justice for dear Ruth

Whose lies and thieving was just proof

That deceiving friends is not very good

In any type of neighbourhood

 

The police caught dear old Olly

Whose life had become far from jolly

For crimes of fraud and awful singing

Led to a jail cell that was really minging

 

So that's the story of poor old Ruth

Deceit and lying, better tell the truth

That financial gain is no way to behave

As she went rightly to her grave !

 

 

Josh Day