Adaptation

Here is a cup of water,
I say to my mother
who has turned inside herself
so much, she had curled into
a pink snail, a little pink snail
with a curved spine, and arms and
legs brought up to her chest.
She opens her mouth like
little birds open their mouths-
expectant, scrawny necks swaying
for Mama bird to pour in the water
or pureed carrots.

Her eyes, her face, are beautiful
and follow me as I enter
her field of vision;
her field of crickets and
wild strawberries strung on a stem
of wild grass in Clarence,
her clothespins and laundry
basket flung up in the air
when a crazy rat snake
curved through the grass
laughing to himself,
gitchee gitchee gotcha.

I found his poor bones scorched
after fire took the field
down to burnt stubble, with Mama
scooping buckets out the crick
to stave off consequences.
I tied them as black crossbones
and hung them from my kite,
giving the rat snake a taste
of his own medicine
as he flew up into the air.
Look, Mama, look.

She now sails by morphine winds
that come in the night,
over fields that whistle and pulse,
her coiled shell shed,
her gaze as clear as Athena's.
Come along snake, she says,
let's go. They ride
in the tossed up laundry basket,
with diadems at her feet
and the wind flowing billow
through her hair