The Yellow Snake

By Gene Twaronite

I can take you further than a ship. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. The Little Prince

I liked him from the start.

People don’t stop and talk

with snakes anymore, especially

about things that matter.

He wished to go home to

his little planet and the vain

silly rose he loved

more than life itself.

He asked me about my poison

and thought I was his savior.

But I wanted only to tell him a story

to live in for a time and forget.

He tried to make me bite,

but I slipped past him in a yellow flash.

I saw him faint and fall to the sand.

But he did not die.

He thought his body was

too heavy and his planet too far.

He thought he needed poison

to leave behind his mortal shell.

But he had everything he needed,

right there inside of him.

As he made his little planet live for me,

so he made it live again for himself.

And you don’t need a snake for that.