Swamp Graveyard

It’s alive here

and yet it seems so dead,

a graveyard of bald cypress,

bladderwort, sun-dew.

Fallen branches

are adorned with turtle sculptures,

lily pads, frog monuments,

and there, on the surface

of a brown, watery, mausoleum,

two gator eyes freeze solemn.

The air is thick and low

like a shroud,

once floating islands root-bound.

If it weren’t for the slithering cottonmouth,

there’d be no movement here at all.

Ironic that.

Signs of life

come down to the deadliest.