Year of the Snake

Snake Song

1 Snake Song I was born in the year of the snake and maybe this is why I speak with a forked tongue. I’ve followed the vague sibilant thread of the voice in my head curling into a tangled snarl of roots, grass, stems and leaves, so that when I open my mouth to talk, a strange song, not mine, comes tumbling out. Ai-noko, half-caste, I tilt my head in the mirror first this way then that—Horikoshi cheekbones, Caucasian nose, my ojii-san’s serious eyebrows feathering like ink strokes over eyes not quite green, not quite brown, in the tranquil white moon of my face. My blood runs hot and cold. Slit me open, let me pare away my body’s tourniquet rind. Itch, twist and tug, I know the lust for heavy glistening coil wrapping itself around reborn coil. I know the dangers 2 of the in-between. And so I keep my skins as transient as the inner tissue-paper wings that ladybugs conceal beneath the spotted shields of their bright metallic shells. And then I shed them, one after another, like the discarded husks of mayflies clinging in tenacious rows to my window screens in the summer, their hollowed sheaths pearlescent—translucent paned scales and two silver wisps of tail. And when wind’s warm breath comes to unlock this instinctive gripping, my ghost selves are carried up like tiny dragon kites spiraling higher, higher . . . higher. ...