My Affection for Spiders - Jan 18 2023

 

My Affection for Spiders

Jan 18 2023

My affection for spiders seems strange

even to me.

But there is something about

that small black arachnid

who has made a home

of my shower stall,

inhabiting the white plastic wasteland

all alone.

How he sits patiently, passively

high on the wall

as if contemplating the world;

hardly moving

from one day to the next,

and seeming to take it in

through his 8 different eyes

with a kind of calm receptivity.

How accepting he is

of my presence there,

without visible fear

or bristling threat.

A peaceful coexistence

I find reassuring

in a hard and fractious world.

How he doesn't annoy,

like the buzzing flying bugs

that hover and bite,

the scurrying ants

invading my pantry

and taking over the house.

How he spins gossamer silk

weaves intricate webs.

Yes, a lethal predator,

but clever and deliberate

not vengeful or vicious.

Who doesn't gratuitously kill

takes no more than he needs.

Who has come to be, dare I say

my small 8-legged friend,

reliably there

sharing our space.

Until the fateful day, that is

my attention flagged

and I washed him down the drain.

You might find it odd

how sad and guilty I felt

accident or not

at the loss of life.

How contingent it is.

How easy

indifference can be.

And how small

and inconsequential

I am as well;

not so very different

in the grand scheme of things

in a vast inanimate universe.

The similarities

all living things share

on this blue and green planet

we call home.

Which, for all I know

is the only place

in all of creation

life exists.