I am a snake charmer

My father was a snake charmer

And his father and all the fathers

Who came before.

I have inherited the gift

Of charming snakes.

I tame them. I make them dance.

People say that I hypnotise them

But they would be wrong. 

I play my pungi 

I breathe in and out

Slowly.

I sway from side to side 

I fix them with my gaze 

But, if truth be told 

It is always the snake 

Who is the hypnotist

And I the willing victim. 

The bond formed in that union of 

Gaze, music, rythm and sway

Is unbreakable on either side. 

Once entered, there can be no treachery,

No subterfuge. No turning back.

Within that hypnotic spell 

The whole universe gathers around us. 

The God of men and Naga, the great snake God, 

Embrace.

Hold fast.

Cataclysms halt.

Harmony ensues.

A shared moment in time.

Who let's go first?

The Hypnotist or the hypnotised?

The charmer or the charmed?

It is never clear.

The wave rises and the wave subsides.

I am a snake charmer and

By snakes I am charmed.