“Snakes”

 

c. 2025 Rod Ice

All rights reserved

(7-25)

 

Snakes slither through the sand

Wriggling with skill

Yet when I gaze upon them, for a peek

Oddly, I see something other than a threat

I see a friend who exclaims, “Welcome, brother!”

I see one who found comfort

On a night when other neighbors were away and busy

And I was there to listen

I see a helper

I see an advocate

Their silvery, slippery skin

Bathed in moonlight

I thought something touched my toes in the grass

While sitting by a fire around midnight

Perhaps it was because my eyes perceived

A trick of the light

I cannot be sure

But the result comes like a confidence man

With a deck of cards

A dried pea, and walnut shells

A slight-of-hand turned magically by serpents

While I was unaware

Look again, friend

Blink twice and tighten your gaze

That sharp tongue darts with the immediacy of a fireplace poker

Hot and prickly

I hear it speak when my back is turned

“Did you hear...? Did you know...? Can you believe?”

The rhetorical flourish of a toilet flush

Sends me low

I needed to know

Long before offering kindness as an innocent babe

Like a cursed, Good Samaritan, fallen along the way

My head clouded with the ceremonial chime

Of finger-cymbals turned invisible

I have to shake my head

When remembering that the fine face displayed

Might be full of disfavor

Fangs pointed, and tipped with ire

The virtual venom of a viper, coming through the telephone wire

Where ‘ere I look

Across the courtyard

Or in the pages of a musty schoolbook

There is that legless cad

Hoping to snare me on a metaphorical fish hook

Teasing my trust

Knees bent, and on my haunches

Crouching and gasping

Eyes averted, with sideways glances

Hoping to take my chances

Taught that the goodness of an intelligent breed

Is carried forward

From its beginning as a garden seed

Look upon my work, ye mighty, and despair

I do not see what is truly there

Green eyes and betrayal

Morph into the darkening, azure blue just before sunset

I could not believe

That I had been so easily deceived

Fool me once

Dance with a dunce

Shake, rattle, and roll

Heaping my head with hot coals of doubt

A hole-in-the-head

When I wanted friendship, instead

Snakebit

Turned endlessly, like a pig on a spit

Glowing with revelation

Knowledge, I did not wish to inherit

Yet will evermore find useful

The yield is great