Kirsten Moreton

Scotland, 2001.
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Lost in the Woods

TW: This poem features sensitive subjects including drink spiking.

I would love some feedback on the poems, especially about how it works rhythmically and grammatically. Please note, I am aware some letters are randomly capitalised, I don't know why it has done this!

Lost in the Woods

She walked, with jingling keys clutched to her side.
With a racing heart, sweating palms and a swelling in her throat.
She stumbled through the streets as they distorted,
as they twisted and contorted.

Through the urban forest where the trees snarled
With faces, and eyes that wandered and stared.
She once felt like a bear in these woods
But now she walked, a shivering fawn.

She stumbled, counting her steps,
Still clutching the dagger by her side.
The trees and monsters within still watching,
And at her dizzy state, laughing and mocking.

With a racing heart, sweating palms and a swelling in her throat,
Her prey instinct kicked in
And she knew she was being followed.
With a whip of her head, and shift in her pace, she nervously swallowed.

She heard laughter, following the sound she found
the sickly smell of smoke and stale beer.
The hazy glowing lights of a bar,
In vile neon spelling out ‘salvation’.

She stumbled in, out of the cold,
Sighing with relief.
Only to find the room
Was filled with the monsters out of the woods.

Their burning gazes bubbled her skin,
As she tripped up to the bar,
Watching as the blood red cranberry
Spilled into the glass like thick black tar.

She turned, hands clutching the steamed glass,
Until she was knocked down.
Angelic as if Debussy’s ‘De Lune’ played
Landing on floor where she laid.

Crimson red stained her satin white armour
And her blonde hair became a tainted pink.
Like vultures to roadkill the monsters flocked
All over a simple spilled drink.

Picking her apart and fussing over her,
a child in a princess costume,
surrounded by the town’s drunks and jesters.
All trying to impress her.

Before she could think
She was handed a cup
An ‘apology drink’
he said with a wink.

Gulping it down in hopes to escape,
She gets up and the room begins to misshape.

Her vision blurs,
Stomach Churns
And her blood runs thick.

She falls,
wondering,
What was in that drink?
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