SIGNS AND STONES AND SNAKES, my project towards a new millennium 1999-2000

Documentation on a social mail art project in support of the Cuereghem area in Anderlecht, Brussels. A park was built on a wasteland right above the underground river Zenne. Snake murals by local kids and artists surrounded the park. A promised catalogue never saw the light, so that was a lesson in cooperation with local authorities. Nevertheless the snake project became one of the best mail art projects I developed, so no regrets !!! Non, je ne regrette rien (dixit Edith Piaf)

donderdag 11 augustus 2011

THE BLACK SNAKE POEM

The Black Snake

When the black snake flashed onto the morning road, and the truck could not swerve-- death, that is how it happens.

Now he lies looped and useless as an old bicycle tire. I stop the car and carry him into the bushes.

He is as cool and gleaming as a braided whip, he is as beautiful and quiet as a dead brother. I leave him under the leaves

and drive on, thinking about death: its suddenness, its terrible weight, its certain coming. Yet under

reason burns a brighter fire, which the bones have always preferred. It is the story of endless good fortune. It says to oblivion: not me!

It is the light at the center of every cell. It is what sent the snake coiling and flowing forward happily all spring through the green leaves before he came to the road.

~ Mary Oliver ~

For more info on this historical poet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Oliver

forwarded by Theresa Ann Aleshire Williams, USA