After Much Debate, I decided to take down Kevin Meaux's Villanelle.
His e-mails barraged my mailbox, ultimately demanding (in the name of all that was holy, to take down, dear God, the poem.) So
I did. I just want you and Mary to know, Kevin, that your the greatest friends ever. And "A Chant for the Devil" is now gone.
Courtesy of Kevin, however; we have a new piece. Enjoy
Snake Handling
I remember their harmless winding
through high weeds and thistle,
their yield and push
among fallen locust leaves.
My cousin pretended faith
as he plucked them up,
swung them until they hummed
and blurred the bright air.
He told me of churches
snakes rolled like oil
over scarred knuckles,
where people prayed with poison
and sang in the tounges
of canebrakes and copperheads.
He took up snakes
as if among the faithful
whose prayers shook them
and toppled their bodies
from the spirit's balcony.
He cracked them like wet rope
against tree trunks
and flung their snapped flesh
into the fallow fields,
spun them upward into limbs
where they hung
beneath the preaching of waxwings.
And when I knelt,
touching the head
torn clean from its body,
I saw the satin jaws
open like a last thought,
striking miracle into my hand.
For More About Kevin Meaux see the Friends Section.