Closing

And finally, everything worked out just fine.

Christmas was saved, though there wasn’t much time!

But after that night, things were never the same.

Each holiday now knew the other one's name.

And though that one

Christmas things got out of hand,

I'm still rather fond of that skeleton man.

So many years later

I thought

I'd drop in,

And there was old

Jack still looking quite thin,

With four or five skeleton children at hand

Playing strange little tunes in their xylophone band.

And I asked old

Jack, "Do you remember the nightWhen the sky was so dark and the moon shone so bright,When a million small children pretending to sleep,Nearly didn’t have christmas at all, so to speak?And would, if you could, turn that mighty clock back,To that long fateful night, now think carefully, Jack,Would you do the whole thing all over again,Knowing what you know now and what you knew then?"

And he smiled like the old pumpkin king that

I knew,And turned and asked softly of me, "Wouldn't you?"