There Is a Snake
       

This isn't a metaphor. And I'm
not the snake. He was really there,
then slithered into the short grass,
under the small bushes that to him
must've been enormous, good
cover. He followed into the small forest.
Then I couldn't see him, so
I continued my way along the trail.
Here, I might as well say it:
I pushed him off the path.
I was worried a bicycle
would gut him. I grabbed
a stick and sent him. I still
want to let him just be a snake.
What else could a snake want?
Mice, water, underbrush, somewhere
to hide, a hole to carve out
channels, span the length
of this brush, narrow
dirt capillaries to explore.
And what could I give him
but a poke. I said I wasn't
the snake and it's true. When I slither
under the grass I crawl along
on my arms. While the snake
disappears, you can see much more
than the outline of my body.

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Copyright © 2019 Bess Cooley All rights reserved
from Iron Horse Literary Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission