The Christmas Play at Infants’ School

As the bleak chill of winter froze pipes round the nation,
At Manor Drive School there was great expectation.
We’d practised our pantomime for several weeks,
In our crepe paper costumes – the nutcracker suite
Was the theme. Not quite Shakespeare as I recall,
But on Christmas Eve there we were packed in the hall
With an ocean of parents before us. And me,
As a soldier in red. So was Michael Beattie,
But for reasons best known to himself he’d decided
He was going to be Batman, and shortly collided
With several girls dressed up as robins and clowns.
We marched to the edge of the stage and frowned down.
“I thought you were going to shoot us,” my mum
Told me later. I muttered, “It’s not a real gun.”
But the highlight that evening was Jack Frost, who danced
In the spotlight, and bounced as he span and he pranced,
Ignoring Miss Blundell’s unsubtle stage cough
Unaware that his crepe paper skirt had come off.