Zombies: A Halloween Slam Poem

Zombies

Through recent years, Zombies have become about as ubiquitous as the imagined apocalypse seems to suggest. They're everywhere like
we've been bitten by some kind of zombie fever. And I recently realized why.

While talking with an acquaintance, I understood that his responses could be replaced by *zombie noise* with barely any difference.
I asked, "How was your day?"
He responded *zombie noise* which I understood as, "Good, you?"
To which I replied *zombie noise* which he took to mean, "About the same."
And so out zombified conversation went on until it came time to part ways.
We shook hands, said our goodbyes, and each shuffled away.
Yet my revelation did not end with the zombification of conversation.

I traveled home to watch TV and see news stories moan about how our economy is in shambles;
the apocalypse, it seems, is walking far slower these days.
Yet this vision is not what made me think we've got a zombie problem on our cold hands.
A few hours later, I turned on to tune in again only to find a commercial claiming that I'm missing
something.
The television blared a horde of images which transfixed me in place for some moments, and I heard *intense zombie noise* creep its way into my room which I
understood as, "Don't you wish you had a big screen TV?
After all, your stomach may be empty, your heart may be slow,
your brain my be tired, but you'll always know
you've got 60 inches or 5 feet through which you can watch the world just
waste
by."

The jingle was disheartening and it gave me a stroke
of insight as my eyes flooded wide, and I
realized zombies are popular because they're as close as the nearest mirror.
I decided that day to take my reflection back.

First, I'm cutting zombification from my conversation.
Of course, unsolicited life stories are about as grave as "good", so instead, I'm choosing epithets like
magnificent,
disheartening,
dilatory, hectic, epicurean, atrocious, absurd, or abhorrent to describe my day in ways that tax my brain.

Second, I've decided to heave my heart into my mouth because anything that doesn't stain my teeth with the pulse of truth
is barely worth the breath to sigh, so if I say [improvise!],
you can bet that somewhere deep in my chest,
my heart is echoing those same syllables beat for beat!

And lastly, if there's even a meager chance that, after death, my body will be reanimated to roam the streets and mindlessly consume,
then that's sure as hell the last thing I'll do while I'm still alive!

So, I implore you to join me;
join me in walking like a zombie only if it's on purpose,
speak the truth
even if blood stains your teeth, and
light up this night by holding your pen like it's a torch
bright enough to put sunspots into a blind man's eyes!

Join me; join me this night that way we may
move the living
and raise the dead!