Adam the Devil Becomes

Eve coos at unborn Abel in her womb

As Cain pipes a nursery song

In the garden where Father Adam

Strolls among each bird and beast.

With names he discerns

Their nature and their purpose,

The ones to eat, the ones to wear,

Those he likes the best, those he likes the least,

Fixing their place on the great table of being

And rejoicing that every thing in the world is his …

Except of course for the long creeping thing

In the bushes, which

In a gesture quite crude,

Flicks out a tongue with a sharply pointed hiss,

To which a speechless Adam —

Now in dismal mood —

A hiss for hiss returns.

Expecting nothing but laughter and applause,

Adam hears on all sides sounds of derision,

Harshly sibilant.

All were transformed to serpents,

Eve and Cain, and newly-hatched Abel,

A family of snakes in the grass,

Writhing in hellish distress.

Of himself he wonders (but not for long).

His face he feels taper almost to a point.

His tongue he feels split into two lines at the tip.

His arms cling flat to his sides.

His right leg entwines the left.

Usurped by contempt he falls.

On his belly prone, a man-sized serpent

Feeling like the very devil himself.