| The summer before I took my first vows I traveled daily to the serpent
mound. A pile of burned rocks adorned its head, which faced the river.
I liked the clean way its earthen flesh rose and fell, coiling around
the surrounding scrub and sumac. It was a long, winding, raised, course
of soil. Carved for a reason I did not know before the days of Conquistadors,
before whites made their way this far west, before the words of Christ
filled the minds and mouths of men. Its dormant structure revealed
nothing. Watching dust blow across its surface, I longed to plunge
a spade through the layers of strata, forcing memory from its dirt
belly. Instead, I remembered how my father told me when he was a boy,
he kept snakes in the top drawer of a butternut chest; They shall
take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not
hurt them. He smiled, You could squeeze the sides of their mouths
together and the venom would run out onto your hands, like canned
milk. |
Rio:
A Journal of the Arts 
.mp3,
1.15 mgs.