Somebody said it was Halloween
I hadn’t a clue till then,
But the street was full of pumpkin heads
Carved out, with the candles in,
And the kids kept saying ‘trick or treat’
Though I didn’t know what for,
They must have thought I was pretty dumb
As I shooed them away from my door.

Then Mandy came out dressed as a witch
With a cloak and a pointy hat,
And waving a broom they call a ‘swish’,
‘So what is the point of that?’
‘Tonight the witches fly to their mass,
Under a harvest moon,
Shut your eyes as the broomsticks pass
Or they’ll put you to sleep, till noon.’

I thought I’d better prepare myself
So broke out my scatter gun,
The moment a witch would show herself
I swore that I’d have some fun,
With Jack O’ Lanterns the only light
As the night grew evil and dark,
I almost forgot that we lived next door
To the Mountainous Ski-Lift Park.

There wasn’t a Moon that eerie night,
It must have been hid by a cloud,
I could hear the chatter of witches, laughing,
How could they be so loud?
At midnight all of the chatter stopped
And everything went so still,
Just as the Moon popped out of the cloud
And the witches flew over the hill.

I saw their shapes up against the sky
Riding their broomsticks there,
With warty noses and pointy hats
And horrible tangled hair,
I didn’t think, I just raised my gun
And I blasted a spray of shot,
And watched each witch as she fell to earth
Whether they would, or not.

Mandy screamed and she seized the gun,
Ripped it out of my hands,
‘Have you gone crazy, what have you done?’
She wouldn’t cease her demands.
‘I saw them flying, up on their brooms,
I blew them out of the air.’
‘They didn’t fly, they just held on tight
Under the Ski-Lift chair.’

Whenever Halloween comes around
I tend to stay in my room,
And woe betide any witch that tries
Approaching me with a broom,
While Mandy locks up my scatter gun,
(That’s the one thing that will chafe),
Then goes to the witches at the door,
‘Yes, the Ski-Lift chair is safe!’

David Lewis Paget