Bullsnake Season
i.
we agree.
only the dogs will eat
eggs slick
with bullsnakes’ passings.
glistening shells like bricks,
salmonella.
still,
we speak love
for doublelidded ebony eyes;
utter greetings through
a door’s closing melody.
the checkered snakecoil,
an oval beneath transom:
you,
I disturb in my daily
egghunt
when I unhook
the chickencoop’s round latch,
peek in to the dim—
uplift an ovular head;
mouthcrease
stitched black & tan.
ii.
yes, every autumn
scales vanish with rising cold.
& yes, I think creatures asleep.
breathing out small
to dens of earthen walls.
your hollow
soon full of gossamer shed.
& yes, everyday: recall:
the jumps we make
frighting ourselves at all
that could end us.
I, bodied,
stilling, heartpounded,
at could-be-snake sticks;
last year’s bullsnake—mangled
tail tucked beneath a bulk so quick
I once fled towards the door:
vertebrate darting from nestbox
to floor an astonishment.
henhouse swirling
unsettled dust in
to a semisolid cloud—
we enter.
I enter,
the gleaming:
sun: dust particulate light rinsed.
shavings crawling in
to boot tread gaps.
iii.
it is a practice:
every entrance stomped:
no surprises of mine made quiet:
out of necessity, I construct
my own small earth shake.
our movements, & ours,
& ours, too,
made loud through sight.
like ceremony. a snake becomes
small beauty. our respect sits
inside our bodies.
iv.
dreaming snakes: dreaming
silklike secrets: once, in dreaming
a snake climbs in
to my bed, grows warm curled beneath
my elbow. in dreaming, a snake I love
becomes lost or dead by noon
v.
look at a sight:
the folded skeleton
between discarded skin
inside the trailer whose door hangs
open only after soul’s departure,
whose bend, I think
replicates the mangled tailed
bullsnake we twice leave out
the dirtiest of eggs for;
meals placed between holes
dipping below the henrun’s walls
tell me, this
is some other
mangled dreamer.
believe me:
I saw a living body,
snake silhouette, curled
between eggs hours before
my key
in the trailer door
yes, I saw
a coal tongue scenting
my heat.
vi.
as any bodied, not yet
frayed to dying,
I mourn your tomorrow.
pray
without action.
in this, I am
proficient.
I memory
last year’s you—wrapped
in departure, shed
skin a shroud
for a slow death.
your spine’s maggots dead.
my unknowing
begging meaning
from you, & the cousin of you
dipping
a striped mouth
to the water bucket
because it is summer &
everyone is thirsty.
Read three poems by Tovah Strong previously appearing in Terrain.org.
Original bull snake photo by Joe Farah, courtesy Shutterstock.