He looked like Halloween in December
After his buddies had ripped his green jeans
And white T-shirt to literal shreds.
It appeared something wild had turned loose
Of his hide just before consuming him for lunch.
Drunk was not the word to describe the man
It was three in the morning and tomorrow
This person was going to marry my sister.
I was thirteen and in fear for my life
When the noise and revelry awakened me;
Mom said he would have to sleep in my room
On the bottom bunk so as not to fall
Out of bed and kill his fool self before the hour
Of his marital bliss, I wasn?t concerned with bliss
As much as with my surviving this night of horror.
I had already slipped downstairs to the kitchen
And secured a weapon, a butter knife was resting
Cold against my hip, held there by the elastic band
Of my fruit of the loom cotton briefs, and was it cold,
Brother-in-law to be was lucky he had made it inside.
At least he was not going to die of exposure to the weather,
And if he behaved himself this night of stab wounds either.
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