Vibrant yellow back
Defiant black streaks
Deceptively cute

Solid almost artificial blue unlike the sky or ocean
Speckled with the night
Assuming an artificial rainbow

Small eyes that radiate innocence
And an equally built body

Your diet is of alkaloids
Psychotropic substances
You use them to protect yourself
Psychedelics have brought you questions you'd rather not answer

I've indulged in the natural poisons
I can see beauty in harm, purpose, necessity
But if I let you be, I know you're no danger to me
Though, I'm a little too late

You're delicate and I am clumsy
You've warned me not to get to close, I’m bound to get hurt
I yield to what yearns to cradle your amphibious nature,
so unique to a monochrome world

Physicality is your weapon
An open wound lets your corrosive membrane transfuse my blood
You flood me
And oh, I moan. Action potential discharged, the sensory impulses to my brain.
You stop feeling slippery in my hand as I begin to rust

Little one, you escape my hands  
But I am paralyzed

Thickened blood, what went so wrong
Tender in touch, I didn't hurt you
But your defensive, corrosive skin reflected your inner malintent

Black mamba venom indisputably pierces the skin
Harsh betrayal of curious wonder
Black widow toxin, an unblunted destruction of the dermis
But you came in celebrated color

How am I to trust visual credibility of sinlessness
You're a poison dart frog
When the beauty that once enticed me
Has hardened the sanguine essence that filled me with vitality and awe