Dead-Zone Forest Poem by Kelly Boutin

We floated through the blue in a hot-air balloon, humming along a willowy tune. In royal skies, a placid moon, we toured the ‘scape until the strike of noon; when we saw the forest.

From above it all seemed calm, a peaceful place, where days are long, giant trees a silent song, draping moss, like waving palms, (or green lost souls.)

We came closer into a bluish haze.
We wanted to see this lure some place, but just like a mermaid's gaze, it held us captive in a maze.
The trees held us prisoner.

The place stank like rotting flesh.
The trees were like carcasses.
A wooden train track hung at rest, leading to a distant fortress, a zombie's walk away.

As a gargantuan gate swung overhead, (a giant dog skeleton draped in cobweb, hanging from the trees like a net,
Ready to spring in an instant,) we realized we were going down.

The thorny branches pulled us close, to the decomposing bones, the ribs snapped, the cage closed.
We were trapped in the Dead Zone, until something got hungry.

Through the eyes we escaped.
There was no time to waste.
We walked the line and found the train.
We climbed aboard and began to pray.
The train was headed to the fortress.

It was dark when we arrived.
There was nothing left alive, save a man with a crime, who had killed and ate his wife.
This man wanted us.

We turned and ran, and as we came, we closed our eyes and began to pray.
Again we boarded the Dead Zone train.
Our hope cried when we saw the bags.
They were filled with chewed bodies.

We passed the ever-restless trees.
The one who drove was the breeze.
We looked around; no enemies, then we looked up, and we screamed; black deaths smiled down on us