A Fear of Snakes (A Video Poem)
In this spoken‑word video, the creator performs a large four‑direction ceremony in Los Angeles, visiting sites that correspond to the cardinal points and offering praise and gratitude. The ceremony is framed as an effort to cultivate a deeper sense of place in a city shaped by colonial history, acknowledging that descendants of colonizers cannot become fully indigenous but can still forge a more intimate relationship with the land. While sharing footage of the pilgrimage, the presenter reads an original poem titled “A Fear of Snakes.” The poem weaves together Hopi snake symbolism, kundalini energy, mythic figures (Apollo, Adam, Eve, Jesus), and contemporary critiques of suburban complacency, spiritual tourism, and superficial appropriation of Indigenous practices. It calls listeners to become “wild,” to listen deeply to nature, to abandon screens and artificial aids, and to rediscover inner “Garden of Eden” through embodied, place‑based ceremony. The overall message is a poetic, urgent invitation to move beyond colonial‑born disconnection toward authentic, wild, and reverent engagement with the earth and self.
Chapters
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