Vintage Happy Halloween Greeting Card with Jack-o'-Lantern & Children

Picture this: three rosy-cheeked children have apparently just committed some minor transgression and now peer over a wooden fence with the smug energy of kids who absolutely just did something they shouldn't have, while one of them hoists a massive jack-o-lantern aloft like a decapitated god — its carved grin significantly more emotionally available than any of the children's faces. The card helpfully reassures us via poem that ghosts walking at night and pumpkins making faces is 'but a joke,' which is exactly what someone would write if they wanted to gaslight you about three dead-eyed Victorian children conducting what is clearly a ritualistic offering. The festive red, yellow, and blue 'A Happy Hallowe'en' banner affixed to the fence reads less like a greeting and more like a warning spray-painted at the entrance to a cornfield where people go missing.