One time, when I was very young and asleep by my mothers breast, a snake came and bit my fleshy hand. My eyes shot open, the world was green, and I saw it’s black and red tail slither off into the grass. I wailed and woke my mother up to tell her what had happened.
With all the tenderness of a mother she searched my body for the bite mark and put the back of her palm on my neck and forehead and checked both my eyes and told me to stick my tongue out and say “Aaaaa” - all while she herself was in such a panic. She held me close while she called the family doctor to rush over. He looked at me with his lights and tools and even his naked eyes of experience, but like my mother, he could not find where I had been bit and no foreseeable illness in me. They said it must have been my imagination and patted me on the head and gave me a lollipop; but I knew what I saw and I knew that if I didn’t find the snake I would be seen as a little fool and even as a liar! And who knew – maybe it’s venom was so pure that it was killing me as I thought about all this...
I asked to be excused and ran to the grass outside our house to find any trace of the snake. At dinner I lied to my mother saying I was not feeling well enough to eat but would prefer to stay in the outside air. I was very hungry but would not pass any opportunity to see this snake and grab it by its throat and make it confess.
Another year went by and another year and I still had not found this snake; almost daily I grew more and more impatient. Every time I thought I saw him and instead found a wet stick or a muddied group of straw I would become more indignant, more impatient. Even my dreams became restless with the anxiety that the snake would appear at night and I would miss my opportunity to grab it by the throat and force its confession.
Another year passed and then a decade and another decade. I did not take a wife and my mother became very ill. I would tend to her but with a great display of inconvenience for she knew that I wanted to be out in the field hunting for my snake, hunting for my confession that would prove I am no liar and no fool. I would lie to my mother about having to work and leave her with the maids so that I could have a few hours before sunset to hopefully come upon this wretched snake.
When my mother died I set up my home in the woods and lived on the remains of her life’s work. My beard grew long and grey and my hair was always unwashed. I would only go into the town once a week to get enough supplies so that I could stay in the woods searching for my snake, hoping for its arrival as long as possible.
I began eating less so that I could make it longer without going into town. I remembered fondly my mother and thanked God for the work she did in life that I was able to pursue the wretched snake with no need for work now. I often cried thinking of having to lie to her or not being able to take care of her when she grew older – and I knew it was the snake to blame. My impatience and fear that I would happen to miss him grew to a hatred for him. How dare he not return? How dare he ruin my life like this and never show his face again?
More decades passed and I imagined the snake to be happy with his family and full of laughter at how he had ruined my life and taken the last few years of joy with my mother from me. My beard grew longer, down to my chest, and my hair reached beyond the middle of my torso. If I would find this snake I would not only make him confess to me but torture him and kill him as I was tortured and dying...
One night I heard a rustling in the grass and as always it sent an impulse through my body from my heart which felt like fire shooting stars through my veins. An explosion; a chance, an opportunity, I ran and ran and saw a tail and reached out to grab it and slipped on mud and fell with my face into a puddle. The tail was only the reflection of my hair, now matted in dreads and down to my waist. The moon shone bright enough for me to see myself after many years in the puddle and I wept bitterly at what I had become. In the shadows I appeared to have the head of Medusa where once my childish locks framed my soft face. My tears created ripples in the water and my old lips reached down to drink. I drank myself in form and in emotion and fell asleep with my face in the puddle.
The next morning I looked again, but there was no use, the snake was nowhere if it ever had even been. Maybe I had been a liar? And if not, then I had become one by my obsession. Maybe I had been a fool? And if not, then surely anyone could see how foolish I had become for so many years. I had given my life for the opportunity to see the snake that bit me, for the chance to make it confess; but in the morning sun, it became clear that none of this was the snakes doing.
Another year passed and another; I slept at night and through the days rested under a tree. In the immensity of eternity, even an old man as myself has his whole existence in front of him.
Another year and another year and three more decades – I must have been nearly a hundred years old by now. The sun was up, and as thousands of times before, I heard the grass move, and still somewhere deep inside me an impulse instructed my eyes open and for me to move to see if I could find a red and black tail – but the peace of eternity quieted that voice and I remained peaceful and resting under the tree with my eyes closed again. If this snake would come to me so be it, if not, let it be – how much more life was I going to waste chasing it?
I could only hear my breath but then the sound of the sand moving and the grass rustling gently opened my eyes.
Its red and black tail was as vibrant as ever and for the first time I could see it’s face coming towards me. So terribly I wanted to reach out and grab it, but the peace of eternity kept me quiet to enjoy all the rest of this life span I could; still closer the snake came, and closer till it began crawling up my folded legs and climbing my beard. It circled around my neck and looked at me face to face after one hundred years – but time is nothing in the peace of eternity.
My arm moved and I put my fist around the snakes neck and pushed it away slowly and gently; thinking to myself I could slay it now, I could make it confess, I could have all I wanted. But to my surprise, the snake seemed to have read my heart and spoke first saying, “I did bite you.”
“I bit you and my infection cursed through your veins for eighty years till you grabbed for your own reflection and drank yourself the night the moon showed you your own head of Medusa.”
“My venom was impatience. You allowed it to boil in your blood and make fear. Its effect was a wasted life spent chasing and in fright. But why would you kill me now? You are not the same person that was chasing and searching and frightened and angry are you? I have had no effect on you, I only hurt who you once were.”
My mind could not think, my eyes stared unflinchingly, shocked. My heart knew this truth all along, the snake was my own impatient striving; my own and fear and anger (my hurt disguised). The snake asked me finally, “So will you not put me down; I do not know you stranger, only who you once were, and you have cured that man of my venom with the peace under this tree you live by now.”
I lowered my arm and as I loosened my fist about the snakes neck his teeth sank deep again into my fleshy hand. My eyes shot open, the world was green, and I saw a black and red tail slither off into the grass. I sighed deeply, a child again, and fell back asleep against my mothers breast.
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