Lawrence Hall
Dispatches for the Colonial Office
A Child’s Thanksgiving…
WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY, YOUNG MAN!?
Sort of like
Christmas, with its own small joys
Turkey and dressing,
but not any toys
Grandpa at dinner babbles
about his bowels
With a chorus of
most dramatic vowels
Grandma discourses
on her surgeries
The latest ones implanted
mechanical knees
Mother and Big Sis
are busy in the kitchen
With a whole lotta
hissin’ and (rhymes with kitchen)
“WHAT DID YOU JUST
SAY, YOUNG MAN!?
DO YOU WANT TO FEEL THE
SWIPE OF MY HAND!?”
“They get it from
those app things today -
I think you need to
take his ‘phone away”
The uncles thunder
on about politics
And any who disagree
are Bolsheviks
The aunts all
painted like marionettes
Escape to the lawn for
their cigarettes
And I am exiled to
the children’s table
With snotty little cousins,
like unclean elves
And eye-brow-warned
to behave ourselves -
And that’s the end
of this Thanksgiving fable
