A Halloween prank two boys planned
Was on  a gentle boy named Stan
For Stan was studious and slight
Never would Stan engage in fight

The two boys told Stan they would pay
Him to perform an act and stay
One night inside a haunted shack
To pound into the floor a tack

Stan wanted to prove he was tough
He took the dare and sure enough
The hammer and the tack for sure
At midnight to  pound in the floor

'Twas Halloween the full moon shone
Stan went inside the shack alone
The clock struck twelve the two boys grinned
Believing Stan would never win

Well sure enough there came the sound
Of a tack being given pound
Three times they heard the hammer fall
Then silence nothing else at all

The next day came still silence loomed
Within the shack which had been doomed
They waited for Stan to come out
Ent'ring the shack they looked about

What they beheld next made them gasp
Stan lying dead hammer in grasp
The gentle boy whom at his chore
Had nailed his shirt tail to the floor

The coroner had said Stan's heart
Must have experienced a start
His face was frozen in a scream
As if he'd had an awful dream

It seemed like he had tried to run
His leg outstretched his shirt undone
Was to the floor nailed held him there
That must have caused him quite a scare

Two boys went missing on that day
Some people said they'd run away
Other folks say that they went mad
Chased by a hammer wielding lad



Jane Noponen Perinacci