It’s so dark in here;
And cold…yes, it’s so cold.
Won’t someone turn on the light?
I cannot see the zombies,
But I’m ready to fight.
Fight for life and limb,
Or run and run some more.
Can’t stop or I won’t survive.
I have to get out of here…
Get out of here alive.
Shhhh…Quiet! I hear….
Close by they are walking.
I will hold my breath and wait.
I do not hear them now, so…
There’s no more time to wait!
Look there! An exit!
Afraid, but there’s no choice.
I pull myself together,
I’m so close….and I….
Open to the weather.
It’s dark outside too.
Though, no time to ponder.
I keep on running….nowhere;
What is the point of it all?
If I live will someone care?
Will they care that I….
I’m surrounded by death?
Care if I’m eaten alive?
Or will they join the feast too?
Laughing: “She was too weak to survive!”
I have stopped too long.
I race to the forest.
Gasping: run and run….and stop.
At my feet the waters’ edge.
I crouch to sip a drop.

My hands reach….but what?
What is that down in the deep?
There is an eerie figure.
I step back and I weep.
Crack. Crunch. Sounds behind.
The zombies! They’ve returned!
I wipe my eyes; turn and gasp!
You are not a zombie…no…
Reality I grasp.
“Hello”, zombie says.
(the zombie: in disguise)
“Hi”, I reply, and it smiles.
A human smile….deep and warm;
A smile…it’s been awhile.
I can’t believe it!
Do my eyes see the truth?
It moves in close and closer.
Surely, it is just like me?
Nothing bad will occur.
I reach out to touch,
And as my hand rises,
It pushes me with fury.
Backward I fall and I sink;
And kick in a flurry.
I am such a fool!
To believe it wouldn’t hurt me.
I can see it’s hateful grin,
But wait, can’t reach the surface!
I look–it is my twin.
Blacker than the black,
It washes into me.
I drown and when I wake: see,
The being on the surface is…
Human, not a zombie!
There were no zombies.
Ran all my life from them;
Was easier to pretend,
They were monsters than to know,
That sorrow in the end.
Sorrow of dying….
Sorrow from rejection.
Terror of being hunted….
Devoured without reason;
And everyday confronted….
…with just trying to survive.
K. Aldaya, 3/18/14
Picture: Photographer Unknown; http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_rOEpjOA3UuM/TSUY3XGnkwI/AAAAAAAAB1Y/ZhI8tTXj7v8/s1600/IMG_4003.jpg