Copyright 2020 by Gary L. Pullman
A
snake came to my water-trough
On
a hot, hot day, and I in pajamas for the heat,
To
drink there.
In
the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob-tree
I
came down the steps with my pitcher
And
must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before
me.
He
reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom
And
trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge
of the stone trough
And
rested his throat upon the stone bottom,
And
where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,
He
sipped with his straight mouth,
Softly
drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,
Silently.
Someone
was before me at my water-trough,
And
I, like a second comer, waiting.
He
lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do,
And
looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,
And
flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment,
And
stooped and drank a little more,
Being
earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth
On
the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.
The
voice of my education said to me
He
must be killed,
For
in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are
venomous.
And
voices in me said, If you were a man
You
would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.
But
must I confess how I liked him,
How
glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my
water-trough
And
depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,
Into
the burning bowels of this earth?
Was
it cowardice, that I dared not kill him?
Was
it perversity, that I longed to talk to him?
Was
it humility, to feel so honoured?
I
felt so honoured.
And
yet those voices:
If
you were not afraid, you would kill him!
And
truly I was afraid, I was most afraid,
But
even so, honoured still more
That
he should seek my hospitality
From
out the dark door of the secret earth.
He
drank enough
And
lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,
And
flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,
Seeming
to lick his lips,
And
looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,
And
slowly turned his head,
And
slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,
Proceeded
to draw his slow length curving round
And
climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.
And
as he put his head into that dreadful hole,
And
as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered
farther,
A
sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that
horrid black hole,
Deliberately
going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,
Overcame
me now his back was turned.
I
looked round, I put down my pitcher,
I
picked up a clumsy log
And
threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.
I
think it did not hit him,
But
suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in
undignified haste,
Writhed
like lightning, and was gone
Into
the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,
At
which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.
And
immediately I regretted it.
I
thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act!
I
despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.
And
I thought of the albatross,
And
I wished he would come back, my snake.
For
he seemed to me again like a king,
Like
a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now
due to be crowned again.
And
so, I missed my chance with one of the lords
Of
life.
And
I have something to expiate;
A
pettiness.
Commentary
D. H. Lawrence
D.
H. Lawrence based this poem on his encounter with a snake at his
watering trough during his residence in Sicily in 1920. The speaker
of the poem’s description of the snake is wonderfully evocative.
The snake trails “his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down,”
and sips “with his straight mouth,” drinking “through his
straight gums, into his slack long body,” flickering “his
two-forked tongue.” These descriptions convey the alien character
of the snake. The speaker views the creature as a “he” rather
than as an “it,” and, in fact, calls it a “god,” a “king,”
and one of the “lords of life.” However, the serpent is no fellow
creature; it is “a king in exile,” and it comes from another
world, a subterranean realm which, unknown and strange to human
beings, is both frightening and rather repulsive. Thus, the speaker
has contradictory feelings about the serpent and what it represents.
The conflict within himself between his admiration for the godlike
serpent and his revulsion toward this creature that lives in the
ground moves the poem to its climax, in which the speaker decides
whether he will accept (or at least peacefully co-exist with) the
snake or reject it. Whichever course of action he takes will suggest
something about his own character and, in general, humanity’s,
since his actions are based, in part at least, on the “voices” of
his “human education.”
There
is something mesmerizing, if not frightening, about the snake, this
creature from a subterranean world unknown and unseen by human
beings. It is a creature that the “voices” within the speaker,
the “voice of. . . [his] education” insist that he should kill,
and a creature of which, the speaker freely admits, he is afraid:
On
the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.
The
voice of my education said to me
He
must be killed,
For
in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are
venomous.
And
voices in me said, If you were a man
You
would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.
However,
mingled with the speaker’s fear of this alien creature from the
underworld is his sense of the snake’s having somehow honored him
by visiting his water trough. The snake is like an ambassador from
the world of nature and an emissary from the world of the unknown.
The speaker has ambivalent feelings toward this otherworldly,
subterranean creature. He fears the snake, but he also “likes” it
and feels “honored” by its presence, even to the point of wishing
that he could communicate with this visitor from “the secret
earth”:
But
must I confess how I liked him,
How
glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my
water-trough
And
depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,
Into
the burning bowels of this earth?
Was
it cowardice, that I dared not kill him?
Was
it perversity, that I longed to talk to him?
Was
it humility, to feel so honoured?
I
felt so honoured.
And
yet those voices:
If
you were not afraid, you would kill him!
And
truly I was afraid, I was most afraid,
But
even so, honoured still more
That
he should seek my hospitality
From
out the dark door of the secret earth.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
The
speaker’s admiration for this godlike creature turns to disgust,
however, when the snake returns to its hole and begins to slither
into the earth. Its utterly alien nature reasserts itself when it
returns from whence it came, and the speaker is overcome with horror,
now that the snake’s “back was turned”:
And
as he put his head into that dreadful hole,
And
as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered
farther,
A
sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that
horrid black hole,
Deliberately
going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,
Overcame
me now his back was turned.
Without
the serpent’s unblinking gaze fixed upon him, the speaker is able
to act, in a cowardly fashion, and throws “a clumsy log” in its
direction, missing the snake. The serpent flees into the hole with
“undignified haste,” leaving the speaker to regret his “paltry.
. . vulgar. . . mean act” and to hate himself and the “voices”
of his “accursed human education,” which had declared that
killing the snake would demonstrate his manliness. Instead, his
attempt to kill one of the “lords of life” made him feel
“paltry,” “vulgar,” and “mean.” Moreover, the sin of
trying to kill the snake makes the speaker think of the “albatross,”
an allusion to the seabird that the sailor in Samuel Taylor
Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" repented of
having killed. Like the snake from the earth, the bird from the sea
(another dimension that is largely unknown and strange to human
beings) represents realities beyond human knowledge and
understanding, represents, perhaps, the mysteries of life and death
themselves. The attempt to kill the snake was as wanton an act of
cruelty as the ancient mariner‘s slaying of the albatross, and the
effect is similar. Whereas the sailor in Coleridge‘s poem is cursed
to wander the world and tell his tale as an act of penance, the
speaker of Lawrence‘s poem is punished by his realization that his
cowardly and petty act has made him less human and less a man. It has
made him a sinner against the hidden, mysterious aspects of life
itself, giving him “something to expiate;/A pettiness.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The
phrase “lords of life” is an allusion to lines in Ralph Waldo
Emerson's "Experience," in which Emerson writes of "The
lords of life, the lords of life,” whom he has seen “pass/In
their own guise" and of which, ironically, “little man,”
puzzled by these mutable creatures of the “race” that he has
founded, is “least of all.”
No comments:
Post a Comment