What Night Was It?

T'was the night before Christmas, and all through the night
The author, Shaun Finnie, had stayed up to write

He stared at his screen in the gathering gloom
And churned through the words for a deadline did loom

Just a thousand to go then his work would be seen
In a national monthly glossy magazine

He focussed intently so didn't quite hear
The noise from above (he's just got one good ear)

The clatter of runners and thunder of hoofs
Left tracks in the snow that lay deep on the roofs

But Shaun was engrossed in his literary script
So he wasn't aware of the old man who slipped

into the room, then with a "Ho!" and two more
Said, "You don't have a chimney. I kicked in the door"

"But what are you doing awake at this hour,
"When good boys and girls snore at forty pig power?"

Now Shaun wasn't stupid. He'd soon worked it out.
There was only one man with a triple-ho'd shout

And he was a master at meeting deadlines
He'd done it each Christmas for several lifetimes

"Oh Santa, please help me," the stressed out Shaun asked
"I'm so far behind in the work I've been tasked

"I'll never achieve all the things I should do
"I'm so far behind so I thought I'd ask you.

"How do you manage, in only one night
"To give each kid presents and judge them just right?"

"It's easy," said Santa, his eyes filled with twinkles
"I felt a bit old and got too many wrinkles

"So now I plan early and just delegate
"I have helpers worldwide. I just sit back and wait

"I can't do it all, not a man of my age
"So I employ an army on minimum wage

"They do all the work but the credit's all mine
"They're all sworn to uphold the traditional line"

This set Shaun to thinking he could do the same
And use foreign employees to achieve his aim

A workforce with English as their second language
Who cares if the work they come out with is garbage?

He'd meet all his deadlines and hit all his wordcounts
He'd soon see a rise in his bank balance amounts

But greed's an emotion from which we all suffer
And Santa disliked what he saw in the other

"You can't go outsourcing your tasks while you shirk
"Using  cheap staff's no way out of hard work"

So Shaun didn't get any gifts from the sack
And the things his Beloved had bought were sent back

For Santa had placed him on his naughty list
But here's where the story takes on a new twist

For Shaun sent the writing to Indian chaps
And now they type stories and blogs while he naps

Who cares if the qualities not quite as good
And if Shaun doesnt pay them as much as he should

Because nobody cares about gramma no more
And spellcheckers only find what they look for

Nobody puts in the hours that it takes
To make sure that the work isn't full of misteaks

At least the delivery deadlines met, right?
"Happy Christmass to all, and too all a good nite!"

© Shaun Finnie 2013 (after Clement Clark Moore and possibly others)