Snake Gifts
by JoSelle Vanderhooft
Once will I tell you, farmer's son --
for the copper soil still clings
beneath your lambskin gloves and court-civet
and gives you away like a scar --
Once will I tell you, headless lover --
for the way you leapt into your princess' grave
despite earth-terror all men recognize
makes you a little fool --
Once will I tell you and no more:
A serpent's gift is like a serpent's word
filled with promise like a skull with teeth.
It glistens, and you long to turn it,
rattle it against your ear
for that permission you already gave yourself:
use me, use me,
and you shall conquer
like the gods before their fall.
This is why you must not take the leaves
the white snake leaves behind.
Though the floor cracks into spiders
and your dead beloved's face pinches into bone
you must let the tallow spend itself to smoke
and let them brittle into dust along with you.
You must not pay attention as he mends his pallid mate
Like a child does up a jigsaw with his nurse:
joint on joint and scale on shining scale
one leaf over each gash your bright sword left
when she tried to sample the confection
of your beloved's sugar-gelled eyes.
It will go hard, but you must endure
like a saint ruptured with arrows
letting death sigh down upon you
like October mist.
Once will I tell you, little princeling
because you seem a goodly sort
if urchins transmogrified to princes
can truly be called good
that you must not place them
on her left eye
on her right eye
on her mouth
that you will swear still bubbles pearls and water.
You must not drape them like a cowl
as if you would rebirth her,
as if that mouth you kissed with promises
would spill forth coins and secrets of the dead
with its first noxious gasp.
Once will I tell you,
things lost should sometimes remain so
and of all the terrors under heaven's swirl
death is often the least.
You may resurrect her,
but what will you do with arms
that still have something of grave-stiffness?
What will she do with your kisses and your moans
having seen the terror of the grave,
eternity spread out like jewels in a trousseau
just to be pulled back for feasting,
farting and the sweat and bloat of sex?
This is the way, my dear,
my well-meaning little boy
hearts that should have softened
up with rot and blue-veined grubs
are made hard and cruel
as untimely death.
This is the way that blushing brides
twist into snakes
and conspire with shadow lovers
to hew their too-young husbands in three sections
his left side
his right side
his heart
still pounding hemoglobin and devotion
like the serpent you threw twitching on cold stone.
For what can fall out but more ruin
when the universe is stirred up like a stew
all for love and longing,
your fear of being lonely and bereft?
Once will I tell you, callow youth --
for you are very young
beneath your worldly swagger
to think of doing all that I've described --
Once will I tell you, and never again
because you've watched me with those glassy eyes
that suggest another kind of death
this one from certainty.
Once will I tell you, and never again
because you then smiled wanly, shrugged,
and turned to make your way
back to your wedding bed,
back to the silky murmurs
of pale serpents in your dreams.
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