Hunger
Adam Tavernier

My bull snake
 lies curled up inside
  the dusty glass
   of its tank. I
  sleep within its
 narrow gaze.

I dream; I wonder
 why it is always Glen
  -- bulbous headed,
   pit bellied Glen with his
    atomic insults --
   who sticks his hand
  into my sensitive,
engorged
fingertrap. But
this time,
veins,
vines,
branches
shoot forth from
his longest finger,
 stretching,
  tangling themselves
   around my heart
  and my appendix.
 And I wonder: What
has Glen not taken
from me? When
will his hunger
hit an end?

With an inhalation
 I awake. The snake
  has escaped its tank,
   burrowed straight through
    the dusty glass,
   leaving behind
  a shell of skin. I feel
 sickness accumulating,
the need to
urp
out
 the anterior backbone
  that has formed
   between my Adam's
    apple and my anus. I
   can feel the diaphragm
  of my stomach opening and
 closing with a gaseous
flup. And
 there is a constant squiggling,
  like a fish
 struggling
in a net, and I
 try
  to pry open
   the hinge
    of my jaw, try
   to reach back
  into the busy darkness
 of my throat, but
I lose myself
 in the haze of
  nausea.

  I feel the snake
 spreading out
from my digestive system,
extending warm branches.
 I eat scallops and
  Riesen candies
   in the same dark mouthful.
  And always: clack-clack
 from my throat,
 tick-tick.
I wonder
if
 man
  can live
   by God alone,
    even as he feels his
   bones thinning and
  his fingernails
 ceasing
to grow.

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