Whose fine filament wavers in the wind
Outside my window? Some spider’s life.
The black arachnid (nearly all except for
The blue and red peacocks, the rainbows,
The irradiated ones, dull browns) spins
Its tale in the corner of the door, its spring
Avoided since it breaks twice a day or night,
Leads to overwork, disharmonious patterns,
Song changing from enticement to avoidance.
I was wounded back then, two of my legs removed
To allow me to walk unimpeded forward, backward,
If not around. I remember the syllables of the joints
Of the web, the intersections where a fly might catch,
And the tremble as I walked along my web home,
The glistening of my lattice on mornings after rain,
When the little wind stirred it, and ants fell from sky.
Now I am a contorted black clot wedged in pebbles,
And no one can spy me out as the grand designer,
My desiccated flesh no food for any insect, flower,
Awaiting only the acidity’s breakdown of carapace
To dissolve onto the basin of the garden underneath.
