Crackity snappity crickity crack,
You hear him when he's on your back,
Snapping his crickity, crackity bones,
The Cracking man spends his time all alone...
This crackity man was not always so cracked,
He was witty, kind; he was loved.
But this snappy crack villain who stands here before us
resembles no past charming fellow...
He stalks through the playground, the corridors lengthy,
Cricking and cracking his way...
His cracking great bellows, his snappy sharp roar,
makes the whole school quiver and quake...
We walk silent and slight, so our shoes make no sound,
lest it find his sensitive ears...
We whisper so gently, so breathlessly quiet,
so our journeys continue unhindered.
From our classes that morning,
to the mid-noon class ending,
We walk briskly and brusquely betwixt.
Sometimes teachers ask meekly,
why "we act so discreetly,
what great secret are you keeping?"
No reply was oft delivered...
...And so uniquely did we busy
our own selves with sports and whimsy,
that our young lives be - even briefly
- free of our completely,
concretely,
terrifying burden...
That crackling man, we would wonder,
"why do his dry bones crack?"
"It's because, they say, he's the ghost of a man
who died of a heart attack..."
"Who says?" one boy asked,
(he was new to the priory)
"I heard it was all just a myth."
And I turned to the newbie,
that nutty neophyte, and said;
"Sadly, the Crackling Man's real..."
I have met him, you know, in the corridors below
the sports hall's air ventilation.
He lives there, you see, where no one will be -
it's like his own private vacation.
The cracker's a spirit who comes here to visit,
but not of his own volition.
He went to this school, where he sat in a stool
while teacher tore lashes from him...
For seven odd years, he was tortured to tears,
because of his speaking condition:
Where he'd stammer and stutter. They thought him a nutter,
and punished him rather severely.
From then on, in his life, he would batter his wife,
his children, anyone really...
And the punishment gave, on his judgement day grave,
was to feel their pain equivalently...
God took the man in the palm of his hand,
and stripped him to only his bones.
He then broke them apart, with the rib cage to start,
Til even his ear bits weren't done.
He jumbled them roughly, then laid them down gruffly
on a smart, construction table...
One by one he glued, hammered and screwed
the little bone bits back together.
He looked different completely, put together so neatly,
but no longer resembled a man...
He stood on two legs, yes that much can be said,
he had arms, knees, hands and a head.
But something was wrong, and it wasn't before long
til his first steps crackled with dread.
Crackity, snappity, crickity, crack,
From knuckle to shoulder, toes, feet and back,
Crack, step forward, crickity stretch
Snappity hand, crackity neck.
White cracking knuckles around a boy's neck,
Crackity, crickity snappity crack...
Each step that you take, 'til your debt be paid back,
Crackity...
snappity...
crickity...
crack.
---------
"So the man comes to kill us?" asked the neophyte boy.
"If he kills you, you're lucky - what he wants is much more...
what he really would like, what he'd really enjoy,
is a frightening thing, to be sure."
"What is it?" he ventured, curious for an answer.
"I'll tell you, if you really must know...
What he wants is more scary than bloody old Mary,
what he wants is the worst thing you could ever imagine:
he wants something of which we're unsure..."
"You call that an answer?!" he threw back at me loudly.
"His intentions, they aren't even known?!"
"Of course they're not, silly, do you think I would really
go up and ask "what do you want?"
I'm not stupid,
you nelly!
You know I can barely retell the whole story
without nearly pissing my pants?!"
"I'm sorry," said the new boy, "I didn't mean to, really..."
"That's fine, it's not your fault..."
Crackity,
Snappity,
Crickity,
Crack.
"Did you hear that?"
"It's him, he's nearby, be quiet now."
And the two sat their shivering silently...
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