Christmas Collateral Damage

(a gen-x sonnet)

I’d wake up early every Christmas Day  
To tear and rip and get my presents first.  
I’d run and scream and though they’d chase away,  
I’d wake’em all! God Damn, I was the worst…  
And then one year I was the last to rise.  
Before I could, with whispered curses said.  
And running here and there, a bad surprise,      
My stupid cousin laying on a bed.  
A bandaged leg, and angry, painful yells,  
He’d shot himself, some dumb-ass lovers’ spat.  
So morning came with blood not Christmas bells,  
No toy recall, but I remember that.  
 When people ask, “remember Christmas when?”  
 I think of wounds the Christmas I was ten.