http://issuu.com/matryoshkapoetry/docs/matryoshka-poetry-vol-1.docx?e=25202252/38736611
Snake
Susurrations
Your rattle,
a porcupine prickle
transformed to sound,
sends the world a warning to be-
ware. You caress the ground, secretly
stealing colour and earthy patina to polish
your scales. Unsuspecting travellers find spec-
tral skin you slough pinned to sharp stuff,
like serpent husks or discarded clothing left
out, drying. It is a sneaky snake, conceit,
that makes even reasonable people a n g r y.
One night, a mustachioed explorer in a natty
pith helmet approached while you slept,
bringing a bomb of condensed hatred.
It exploded, ripping you apart
to fall like sherbet bits
that f i z z e d
as they
h i t
the ground.
Cursed by God and man
to fashion deserts and shorelines,
you slither at night, or when receding
tides give traction, in an endless task that
lasts even after death - ghost snakes taking
up the action. The spectral serpents slither on
beaches, when the muddied boundaries between
wet and dry form rivulets and r u n n e l s of
serpentine creations, and casts.
Unrecognized by crafts-
men you rise on the
breeze, glimpsed
briefly l e v -
i t a t i n g
inches above
your handiwork.
Hardy beachcombers, who
deny your snaky interventions,
daring to say it’s a phenomenon of wave
action, are coiled about on breezes salted
with snake tears, their skin chaffed with
bitter disdain and calling-cards of sloughed
scales and sand particles. You leave
yourself embedded in human skin,
a temporary reminder of hom-
inid stupidity and your
obvious, sinuous
superiority.
Karen Barton
first published in Matryoshka Poetry Vol. 1
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