Snake Poem by elysabeth faslund

You coiled your length around me
Until I saw, swore I saw
Your forked tongue
Flicking in and out of the years
That hatched us in those cold dens
With colder mothers.

They coiled their lengths around us
And squeezed
Until tears rolled down my face.
Yours was lit by a smile
As you baby-fondled the
Icy scales of that
Woman
Who never slithered far enough
Away from you,
And the broken shells of
Your youth.


(Published in 'Rites of October' Oxhead Press, Minnesota.)