Christmas with Kids

Never underestimate your child’s capacity to learn and don’t think you can fool them either. I found this out the hard way one Christmas morning many, many years ago.  Of course, being a poet at heart, I wrote a poem about it.

It is one of the first poems I wrote way back in 2011. I have tweaked it up a bit since then but the story is exactly the same and every word is the absolute, hand-on-heart truth.

I also won the novice original section for performance with it at the North Pine’s Bush Poetry Festival in 2013 and cemented my love for Australian Bush Poetry. I rarely perform these days, preferring to stick to writing, but this poem will always hold a special place in my heart. I hope it brings a smile to your face. Merry Christmas everyone…

SANTA CLAUSE AND THE FERAL PIGS

I was getting things ready on Christmas eve night

and decided on adding some extra delight

so I powdered a path from the door to the tree

and made little hoof prints for the children to see.

I thought I could show them the reindeer had been

and then watch their reaction to what they had seen.

To believe in the magic as only kids can

but as usual things didn’t stick to the plan…

for the children woke early and sat by that tree

and were shaking their heads at the prints they could see.

They had gotten this book which they held in their hands

Called –The Big Book of Hoof Prints from Across the Lands.

Well, the family arrived and we all gathered round

but the kids kept on checking those tracks on the ground.

Then they solemnly said, to my lasting dismay –

It was eight feral pigs that had pulled Santa‘s sleigh!

So the family all listened with mouths hung agape

while my children explained from the size and the shape,

that the ‘evidence’ now was convincingly clear,

Santa Clause used razorbacks instead of his deer!