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Snake Charmer
by sadh Sunday, Nov 30 2014, 4:16am
international / poetry / post

like a moving cloud
that slowly shifts and drifts
in space
oblivious to the tribulations
of the earth below
i unshackle the chains of cultural
formality
and free myself in order to
create

[i learned from the originals
how to roll time and space
into a whole continuum]

easy exhilaration is the best description,
it comes like a tantalising tug on the brain
followed by a pleasurable tightness
in the solar plexus
a poem approaches from the collective
creation of all things -
u see, i am a thief, i write nothing
i have learned to allow the poem to write itself
while i play medium to a million voices, muses
and other forces that appear and disappear like clouds
in the sky

this method saves me labouring and endlessly editing
like my prose writing brethren,
the poem knows what it wants to say

for my part i am responsible for typos,
which are hidden by the mind’s propensity
to fill in errors
until i read it some time later and detect the typos
however, my guests write it perfectly
i merely transcribe, my errors are obvious
though invisible at the time of rendition -
meaning is never lost, my guests
are always well pleased and extremely grateful
that i provide this service for them

a serpent rouses from its coil
and raises its head scanning everything
with its penetrating, dangerous eyes,
it tastes the wind with its
flickering tongue

i know this serpent well, it lives
at the root of a tree that extends its branches
to infinity

i know what i must do, chase this viper up
the tree to prevent it becoming a predator
of the earth -- a waste of its enlivening
power and special abilities

i move rhythmically charming it
until it becomes transfixed ready to strike
the person that disturbed its repose.
breathing rhythmically i use my eyes
to attract its gaze
but do not engage the real organ
of sight (the brain)
to the eyes of the snake
as it always detects weaknesses
and seeks an opportunity to kill or ruin

but not this time my slippery, lethal
friend, i allow no direction but up
to the branches where it is free to decide
which electric branch it will take
to infinity

in the middle of the dense foliage of leaves
and heavy fruits a light emanates which signals success,
the gate to paradise is thrown open,
i enter and confront the poem
which has here been transcribed

a word of warning,
should u encounter this serpent
it will resist and struggle to remain
on terra firma, u must guide, lure and force
it to go where it usually does not -
u see it really cannot climb trees yet u must succeed
in forcing it upwards or risk losing ur life and/or sanity
if u fail

the poem rendered i am free to enjoy my reward
and course freely in the endlessness of paradise