Don't Steal My Bones © 2008 Colin Whyles

Don't steal my bones when I'm not here
I'll want them on the other side
Don't steal my bones when I'm no longer here
You'll leave me absolutely nothing left to hide
I want to make a rattle
To frighten all the kids
I want to play the xylophone
I'll do it on my ribs

Don't steal my bones when I'm not here
And leave me nothing I can call my own
Don't steal my bones when I'm no longer here
I'm particularly fond of every one
A skeleton that limps is scarier by far
Than one that rattles briefly in the night
Looks vacant
Disappears from sight

Don't steal my bones when I'm not looking
You'd hate it if you couldn't see me coming
Don't steal my bones as though I'm blind
No-one ever said I wouldn't mind
I'd look a proper silly-billy
If I couldn't stand upright
But fell over like a jelly
That hadn't set quite right

Don't steal my bones when I'm not here
And leave me absolutely nowt at all
Don't steal my bones when I'm no longer here
Them what buries me would be appalled
I don't ask to take the Crown Jewels
I just ask for what is rightly mine
A rattlesnake impression when I walk
While you just squish along behind

Don't steal my bones when I've gone
How would you look me in the face?
Don't steal my bones when I'm gone
They might mistake me for the invisible man
You need a brace of bones
To play the spoons
But just leave mine alone
I've counted all two hundred and six
And I need every one
There would have been one more
But it's already gone
(It's sitting over there...)

Let's make no bones about it
Bones is all I've got
So leave them with me when I'm gone
And I promise I won't haunt you —
A lot.