--
Twas the week before Christmas, when me and my spouse
Had the crazy idea to go buy a house;
Four decades of renting and now here we are,
Let’s pack up the boxes and load up the car;
--
We won’t tell the children, we’ll sneak out tonight,
They’ll wake in the morning but they’ll be alright;
So mamma in her ‘kerchief and I with the cat,
We packed and we loaded and started to scat,
--
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
We sprang from the car to see what was the matter,
I circled the auto and saw in a flash,
The box way up top had come down with a crash.
--
The pots and the pans on the new-fallen snow
Gave a cluster of flap to our ebb and our flow,
When, what to my wondering eyes should come then,
But a big moving truck and eight big burly men,
--
With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted and called them by name;
--
"Now, Aidan! now, Henry! now, Caesar and Dex!
On, Griffin! on Garrett! on, Eli and Rex!
Load up all their stuff! Every bit, wall-to-wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
--
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So off to the new house the coursers they flew,
With the truck full of stuff, and St. Nicholas too.
--
And then with a sinking, I saw on the truck
Our daughter, in bed, still asleep, hair amuck.
So I drew up ahead, and I turned them around,
And delivered her back to her room, safe and sound.
--
Still dressed in our pj’s, both mamma and I
We’ve made our escape, late at night on the sly,
A bundle of questions we bandied about,
As we followed the troupe, we started to doubt.
--
I waved Santa down for a long heart-to-heart,
Expressing our feelings about this new start.
His droll little mouth it drew up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;
--
I told him how we were afraid of indentured,
He told me no gain without being adventured;
I rued all the rules and I trembled my fears,
He laughed and he asked, “where've you been all your years?”
--
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed along with him, in spite of myself;
The wisdom of Santa, it flooded my head,
He gave me to know it's still nothing to dread;
--
We spoke no more words, but went straight to the house,
They unloaded our stuff and I turned to my spouse,
And laying my finger aside of her chin,
I said, “it’s our house, welcome home, let’s go in.”
--
Then Santa emerged, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim as he got in his truck,
“It’s clever how far from your kids you have snuck,
You might send them your address sometime before Spring.
Happy Christmas to all, and to all everything.”
--
