A cold blooded heaven
By Brandon Astor Jones
While viewing a Public Broadcasting religious program, wherein those who worshipped did so with the chilling aid of several deadly vipers, this writer decided to present one snake's fictional perspective.
Sometimes the incessant rattling is unbearable. Nevertheless, one learns to endure the noises of confinement, despite the fact that each of us are entwined together, not unlike a transparent box of loud pretzels.
Lil' Tex, the only sidewinder in our group, as usual rattles the loudest as the sliding plastic opens to permit one of the many strange creatures gathered around outside our Plexiglas prison to reach in and grab one of us. It is torture, pure and simple.
Of course, it is all very legal. You see, it is called "religious freedom". They have rights you know. They will be back in a little while. We have no rights at all, as far as they are concerned.
The sliding plastic opens again: Billy Bob is thrown back in with us, as Ole Suwannee is taken out. He is from down around the Georgia/Florida border. We call him that because he is always bragging about his river. I hear it is drying up.
We think he has some moccasin blood in him anyway. I mean, you can look at his scales and tell that he is mixed. He has no rattle. You know what else? He does not slither here and there like the rest of us: He just meanders along.
He does not like it up here in the big city very much. Then too, he is a lot older than the rest of us, but he has a kind and caring disposition ... that makes him easy to like. I noticed that he does not inflict pain upon others — not even the religious creatures — even though he has two of the strongest and longest fangs in our group.
Ole Suwannee has not eaten anything for a couple of months. The creatures like to feed us rats: they do not know that we hate rodents, even if we do eat a lot of them. What with all of the worshipping going on about him, we should not be surprised that he has lost his appetite. Starvation, I am told, is a very painful death. Rats are the pits!
No one in our group has bitten a creature, so far, but I hear that the best way out of this joint is to bite one of the creatures when (s)he picks one of us up.
The creatures are a strange lot. They are funny to watch sometimes ... they are forever putting their noses upon the plastic, seemingly in an attempt to provoke our individual and collective reaction. They never tire of peering in at us as they intrude upon our sleep with their fingers constantly pecking intrusively on the glass ... reducing our dreams to little more than nightmares.
We more often than not respond by individually or collectively sticking our tongues out at them. That, believe it or not, seems to placate them. Like I said, they are a strange lot.
As for myself, I have decided that the next time a creature grabs me ... hiss ... I am going to bite that creature. I am sure my bite will be a painful shock that will make the creature drop me. That is when I will make my break ... hiss ... to slither away to freedom!
Hey, pipe down! A creature is bringing Ole Suwannee back. I can see his mouth is open. He is hissing frantically. One of his fangs is broken (a terrible silence befell the inner sanctum of our transparent pit as we, in turns, recognized the look on Ole Suwannee's face to be the expression that is a snake's prelude to death.)
In reptilian fear, we all cringed and slithered away from the plastic opening when the creature placed Ole Suwannee back into our midst. No longer lissome, he had been rendered a listless mass devoid of his usual prideful coil and rattle.
His mouth in death's agape released his last series of nearly inaudible and broken hisses. He then took one deep and clearly agonizing breath and uttered a strange declaration: "Hiss ... hallelujah brothers and sisters ... HALLELUJAH". Then his mouth slowly closed shut in death.
Taken aback by the sight before me, I felt very much alone, despite the presence of the rest of the group. The scene became myopic and sadly tranquil. I thought to myself, "Hiss ... damn, hallelujah indeed! At least Ole Suwannee did not starve to death. Which of us will be next?"
[The writer is a prisoner on death row in the United States. He welcomes letters commenting on his columns. He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, EF-122216, G3-77, Georgia Diagnostic & Classification Prison, PO Box 3877, Jackson, GA 30233, USA.]