The Badgers of West Taxideles
This was a poem I wrote for World Badger Day on October 6th but that ended up coming out several days after that. It's a horror poem that's almost a prose story about the strange town of West Taxideles and the bizarre badgers that live there. It's a mysterious place isn't it?
On a side note this is also one of my favorite things(poem, short story, etc.) I've ever written. Originally posted in October 2020
The Badgers of West Taxideles
By: A.X. Bueno
A wheel on your ride skids off and burns
Turns out you'll be stuck for a while to learn, about West Taxideles
It's the city these strange badgers call home
A land where no humans roam, West Taxideles
These badgers on two legs they walk
They're about five feet tall and use chitters, snorts, keckers, and growls instead of words to talk
They like to disappear to sleep during the day but at night come back to hunt, gather and play in West Taxideles
Here in this sett of badgers you'll feel alone as the badgers mingle and hunt on their own
It's an eerily quiet town with many buildings unused and blood scatter about the ground
There's even a few pieces of human clothes around but no humans to be found but at least it's not East Taxideles
Over there are big, nasty wolverines
And a series of painful gurgling screams over at East Taxideles
No over here is badger town
Here many different types of badgers are around
American, European, Honey, Hog, various Ferret and even hybrid Badgers abound
They all watch you with suspicion and unwavering interest as you tread the crumbling ground
Eventually you see, after all your walking around
A familiar sight and smell a familiar smell in this very old, unfamiliar town called West Taxideles
A car sits with it's tires slashed and removed
The car doors are open with their metal bruised
Along with the clothes caked in dried blood that you're guessing at one point oozed
It's about time you decide
Time to get out of West Taxideles
But that's when the badgers start to surround
They look hungry and a few start trying to pin you to the ground
But since they aren't very big you manage to escape and try to scream
But they somehow steal your voice before you can and now on you they're starting to convene
You run to try to escape this nightmare scene
The badgers chitter and almost seem to laugh now as they follow you through the town it seems
But unfortunately for you your fate was already sealed
And the badgers squeal with delight as they catch up to you, their meal
They sink their teeth right into your flesh
But after a while they stop eating and leave you a sopping mess
Your blood gushing in places and you with chunks strewn around a few spots on the floor
As you sit there dying they watch and then you realize what they are standing around, waiting for
You feel the change happening to all your flesh that still clings
The fur starts to spread and every part of you stings
Pretty soon you see your human hands start to become paws
And oop, out pop your big badger claws
You shrink a little as your body adjusts
You gain the build of a badger and you're too weak now to make much of a fuss
West Taxideles has now claimed you
You're now part of this bizarre badger clan
You tried hard to escape but no one who comes to this town stays a human
Thanks to the curse of West Taxideles
You were always going to get stuck
I guess you were just straight out of luck
For you are now one of the many badgers of West Taxideles