For Tourmaline .’s Halloween Challenge “zombie,” I wasn’t sure what to do. I’m not a fan of dead people walking around trying to eat my brain, so I avoid them. Yesterday, however, I had to go to the store, so I took a look at the slim Halloween offerings (my local Walgreen’s shelves were quite bare), and found a few fun zombies. This morning, I hopped out of bed and “unboxed” my wind-up zombie that poops candy. What a great way to start the day.

And speaking of zombies, I watched the new Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City trailer this morning. The movie looks pretty dumb, but it has some cool looking monsters in it.

OctPoWriMo

Today’s prompt is about finding balance. Living a creative life, it often feels like everything I do is work, and that I’m always working. However, I’m working at the things I love, and I am always playing (or should be). It’s a sad part of the human condition that ecstasy wears off. Everything, no matter how wonderful and enjoyable, becomes work eventually. How do I find that sweet spot where I’m improving, but still ecstatically enjoying the process?

The Balance looks like a fun form. I’m going to give it a try.

Waking the Zombies

talons balanced on live wires ignite fires
slicing and dicing upon flight
sparks in the dark excite
my mushy mind
to find

a sign
for these dark times
every monster alive
alert and flirting for brain-bites
meets ancient rites and smoke-filled skies from pyres

carefree banshees alarm like squealing tires
mired in blood the body still fights
a dance of duck and dive
freezing fear climbs
and chimes

through grime
I design crimes
against the monstrotized
the zombie hoard, now bored, alights
talons balanced on live fire-wires ignite

That form was fun, but didn’t feel like surrender, so I’m going to try a Cadralor to further explore my yearning for balance. Over at dVerse Poets Pub Björn challenges us to try this poem form made of 5, unrelated, numbered stanzas created by the editors of Gleam.

The Scales

1. moans and groans fill the blood-red morning
waking bones creak, seeking footing
then should-ing begins even before
pouring the mind-pricking poison

3. in the carnage brain-eaters stain two-seaters
like teenagers on a rampage hearty to party
after, their bodies teeter entranced like plants
to a heater, a sunbed of the well-fed undead

4. slanted light heightens delight as I search
out the angles and tangles to represent
my vision without derision or indecision
I click and snap intending dissection

5. The swell and the crest of the wave
rolling through each making day at play
equivalent gold dishes chained, swinging
fiercely alive, tamed, murdered, revived

Writober

With everything going on, I almost forgot about the fun writing prompts of A. M. Moscoso’s Halloween Prompt Challenge over at MY ENDURING BONES. Luckily, I saw her story, “The Lady in the Walls,” yesterday which reminded me.

I think Rafael and Anouk’s story which I am drafting today will cover:

• Being lost in the woods at night and something following you
• Losing any knowledge of who you are or where you live
• A repetitive scary noise without any apparent source

Tomorrow, I’ll share the title and an excerpt, then I’ll find another image and microstory from previous Writobers to turn into a short story. Do you have any favorites?