A Scurvy Pirate

One-Eyed Jack

By Josh Watkins

One-eyed Jack,

Scourge of the seven seas.

The wind at his command,

It bows below his knees.

The blade on his belt,

Clings firmly to his side;

It deals menacing blows,

While controlling a battle’s tide.

His face bears many wounds,

Each pulsing with hate;

Fear rules his foes’ hearts,

For death is their ultimate fate.

Treasure is his lust,

Gold his only love.

Diamonds emblaze his fingers,

Emeralds, his battle glove.

There on the horizon,

A mighty ship he spies.

Tis a Spanish galleon,

A vast and noble prize.

The sea grows cold and gray,

For blood is about to be shed,

A deadly battle is about to rage,

Soon to turn the blue waters red.

He hoists the Jolly Roger

To the top of the mast,

Sending the captain a message,

This battle is to be his last.

The captain turns his vessel,

And opens the cannon doors,

How he longs to be fighting

Back on the English moors.

 “Be brave!” the captain shouts

“This brigand we must slay!

To his Maker he must go;

For his evil deeds he must pay!”

The captain could now see Jack’s eye,

Its cold and deadly stare,

Neither man backed down,

Both ready to face the guns’ flare.

Jack grinded his teeth,

The captain clenched his fists,

“OPEN FIRE!” they both yelled,

And the guns blazed through the mist.

Iron balls tore through the sky,

Splintering wood and goring flesh,

Men lay dead in the sea,

The decks a bloody mess.

  The captain makes a daring charge,

Sailing within mere feet,

Fearing not the imminent danger,

One-eyed Jack he soon shall meet.

The ships suddenly collide,

With a mighty, splintering crash.

Pirates board the galleon,

Blades of cutlasses flash.

The captain sees the white of Jack’s eye,

And his menacing toothy grin.

His hand he places upon his sword

Praying this isn't a sin.

The captain and Jack draw their steel,

Clashing in a fiery rage,

Bullets flew, men fell,

Chaos filled the stage.

The established sea-men

Could not push back the scum

They moved by the will of demons,

Fueled by fire and rum.

 The captain was losing,

Jack’s crew had him beat.

Their future looked grim,

There was no retreat.

Then there was heard a violent blast,

Two gapping holes were made.

Both ships were doomed,

A lowly sailor’s debt was paid.

Jack roared with rage,

His eye became blood red,

Seeing all that gold

Spilling onto the sea bed.

The disturbed pirate lost control,

Swinging wildly to strike a blow.

The captain fought on,

Changing the battle’s flow.

The pirates tried to retreat,

But their sloop had just sunk,

They were now like rats

Trapped on a Chinese junk.

Jack made a run for the gold,

As his crew abandoned ship,

He took a blade across his back

And a bullet in his hip.

“To the life boats!”

The captain yelled.

“Not one more soul

On this day shall be felled!”

The captain drew his pistol,

At Jack’s head he aimed,

This pirate would die,

Broken, wounded, and maimed.

Jack laughed an evil laugh,

And drew his cutlass high,

He charged the captain straight,

Ignoring the pain in his thigh.

The pistol spewed shots of death,

Missing low and missing high,

But one lead ball hit its mark,

Right through Jack’s good eye.

The smoke from the burning hull

Clouded the once clear air,

The captain abandoned ship,

Waiting no longer did he dare.

 The survivors rowed

Out of harm’s way,

Thanking God that they

Lived to fight another day.

Another explosion then rocked the sky,

Gold and debris rained down,

Yet the body of One-eyed Jack

Was nowhere to be found.

Today as ships sail,

Not a sailor has the lack,

To tell the harrowing legend

Of the feared pirate One-eyed Jack.

This will begin a three piece series where each poem is a story about a fictional character I created. In each piece I attempt to tell each character's tale in the most epic way. When I look back on them, I am amazed at the story and detail I was able to tell from the simplest of inspiration. I take great pride in these pieces each of them touches different aspects of my life in a way. This one for example, spawns from my interest in the glory days of the pirates: Blackebeard and his Queen Anne's Revenge, Calico Jack, Henry Morgan, buried treasure, Spanish galleons, etc. 

The thought came to me when I was on my way home from a bible study during my Christian internship. Timothy had put a plastic spoon with a broken handle up over his eye and for some reason I thought of a pirate and how I had not written a piece on that topic before. I was going to call the pirate One-Eyed Tim, but I didn't want to associate Timothy with such an evil, so I borrowed a real pirate's name (Calico Jack Rackham) and created my own legend. 

Confusing lines: "A noble sailor's debt was paid". The sailor was once honorable and true, but then fell on hard times and greed ruled his heart. He left his job and became a pirate, terrorizing the men he once sailed with. In a battle he was captured, but his life was spared. He slowly was returning to what was good by starting from the bottom and serving as a servant on a Spanish galleon. Realizing his crew was in trouble and seeing that their gun deck was all but destroyed, he overloaded a functioning gun and lit the fuse. The blast blew the cannon to pieces, killing him. But his sacrifice put the fatal mark on Jack's ship and rendered his firing deck useless. Who knew one little verse could contain a story within? Maybe I should write a piece on this valiant sailor.

A Chinese Junk was a Chinese sailing vessel that was used for carrying goods, people, and in some cases, for war. The had full battened sails. Google it, expand your knowledge of ancient ships.