THE NIGHT A SNAKE TURNED INTO A RIVER
6 August 1945
11:15 p.m.
This time, the wings are
Extensions of myself: I am flying
For the first time without motors and gas,
But feathers and wind.
Still, the weight of 9,000 pounds drags me down.
I feel gravity’s pull on my feet, on my gift of
light- the gift of knowledge I have
for the world. When should I let it go? Now?
“Yes,” mother says, “Let that little boy go.”
From my dropped fire-seed, the world
Brightens in a blue-white flash. The world is
Made fresh. The release propels me toward the sun, which
No longer frightens me; it no longer threatens me.
When I look down, I see a tree grow. It grows
Quickly, laden with red; the new Eden begun
I have given the world what they want.
From below, I hear “No,
This is your death, This is our death.” Beneath
My tree unfurls the serpent whose tail still
Bleeds from its bite. Even as he moves
In the shadows of the tree, the heat
Strips his skin. He is unmade
And remade for eighty generations until his
Body becomes as thick as a river
And the ground covered with his dead.
“You cannot make me dance,” the snake whispers.
“You cannot make us dance” the skins rattle in reply.
Now there’s five unfurled and burning.
Each one marked.
Each one carries the ashes of its parents
On its back. The generations grows larger and
Larger until they reach the boughs and
Consume the fruit, hanging helpless on my tree.
John Rodzvilla teaches in the Publishing and Writing programs at Emerson College in Boston. His work has appeared in Harvard Review, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, gorse, DecomP, and several others.