The Escape

   As the setting sun fell over another day thoughts of it’s memory began to fill my concentration, reflecting on it’s events as I tore through the atmosphere towards the moon.  What started off as an adolescent dream was now a reality as my homemade rocket ship vibrated and ascended me to a weightless state of being.  Looking out the window of my shoddily crafted cockpit I reminisced on what I had escaped from mere hours ago.  

It was a typical morning chasing my fleeing thoughts as cooked them for breakfast and pondered over ones task for the day.  The ‘to-do' list, as I called it, never seemed to shrink as one job completed would often add two or more separate responsibilities that would create more, like a snowball that never stopped growing in size.  Today one would be tending the grounds of the lost, the more peaceful contracts yet was personally my least favorite due to the trip being daunting and requiring most of one’s strength staying sane while there.  While I ate one glanced over the room shack I called home.  A pile of unwashed clothes , a broken TV, a few worn books, bucket for hygiene, a dust covered brown box with the words ‘escape’ barely legible on it were all that a modest life got.  It wasn’t much, but it was still home, and one would get to enjoy the day not being a prisoner to it. 

   Outside the air was arid and stale, the ground was covered in ash as patches of decomposing vegetation lined the outskirts of the Flying Dragon forest.  In the far distance one could make out the ruins of a city, but I would have no need to venture towards its dystopian architecture as ones chores laid due south of here.  Ravens began singing to my presence as I began my trip to the lost lands.  Not many venture out this far but the few able are somnambulant to their surroundings and soon after entering the forest they would fall prey to its madness within minutes unable to match its wit.

The trees of the flying dragon, if one could even consider them trees, were a thick tangle of branches that more resembled a slithering serpent climbing upwards and sideways than actual branches and covered with thick thorns the size of ones fists.  The sky was suffocated by each of their outreach limbs.  If one didn’t pay attention to the path one might find themselves fighting for survival against the madness of consumption and never seen again.  Tales were told from the city of the dangers the flying dragon forest presented but that never stopped the few souls brave enough to venture this far just to be eaten by its chaos.  You see, this was no ordinary foliage as nobody could see the forest through the trees, let alone the path that seemed to be ever changing, each day, was harder to find if you were looking for it.  I found through experience to just put one foot in front of the other and allow the mind to go blank was the easiest way to navigate through its madness.

Eventually the forest subsided as the land of lost began to peak on the horizon and the weeping willows of its domain became more visible.  Here, on its edge, the country broke into rolling hills as far as the eye could see covered in the patches of Bleeding Hearts, Lavender, Cerbera Odollams, Chrysanthemums, and Stargazer Lily’s.  The air was no longer stale and the sky was a moderate turquoise with traces of maroon gradating towards its horizon.  There wasn’t a single cloud in the sky but that never stopped the red mist from falling all over the land.

   My job was simple, tend to the grounds of the trees and prevent the flying dragon from overrunning this peaceful land.  This was not a easy task to perform as anybody who ventured this far outside the city would find their final resting place somewhere in the field as they attempted to regain their strength, and sanity, from the thick brush they had just ventured through.  One would say that this is a job specially tailored for nobody, and I would tend to agree at times like these against a forest that continuously grows like mold over rotten fruit.  

   Mid day.  As one sat under a grand willow tree I would listen to the ravens singing their somber songs that echoed throughout the land like a lullaby.  Infernal creatures.  One would rather listen the peaceful emptiness of the void and soothing sounds of the red mist than endure another minute of their hymns.  Only one raven had grown on me over the years of servitude to the lost.  A peculiar bird with an even more peculiar rhythm to its songs.  The only one, in fact, that would follow me along my travels and even perch and sing on my roof while I was inside my house. 

This place was starting to overwhelm me as one could begin to hear the whisperings of the willows more now than when one first arrived; a side effect of spending too much time in lost. One would swear the trees were actually speaking as the wind blew through their branches and carried their voices through the land with a single word spoken in unison over and over again; escape.  If one wasn’t diligent in their tasks one would grow roots here, becoming a permanent resident until another nobody made it through the dragon forest.  Thankfully my chores were almost complete and one would be allowed to return to the confines of home afterwards.

   Evening was now here as I began my journey back to the outskirts of the city but due to the length of time spent in lost one was still hearing the whispers of the willows deep inside the forest as one got home.  Inside, the brown dust covered box begged and taunted me to open it one last time.