SNAKEBITE

I am the one

And there is no way not
To be me not to have been flagged

Down from underneath where back
Drop ten deadly and
Dead pine logs here and where
They have fallen. Now come

To surprise:

Surprise at the dosage at the shot
In the foot at the ground

Where I walk at what
It can do and the ways
Of giving: at dry fish scales
That can float away

In a long dusty arm

Now getting itself frankly lost
Swimming against the current

Of pinestraw winging under a stump
And a stone. Here is where
I am the one chose:
Something has licked my heel

Like a surgeon

And I have a problem with
My right foot and my life.

It is hard to think of dying
But not of killing: hold the good
Foot ready to put on his head
Except that it leaves me only

On a stage of pine logs

Something like an actor so
Let me sit down and draw

My tiny sword unfold it
Where the dead sharpen needles
By the million. It is the role
I have been cast in;

It calls for blood.

Act out before the wind
Blow: unspilt blood

Will kill you. Open
The new-footed tingling. Cut.
Cut deep, as a brother would.
Cut to save it. Me.

By James Dickey