Goodnight Spider

October is the Month of the Spider

those eight-legged hunters, pregnant and fat

hang low, with wide-cast webs

to catch the most unwary meals

for ravenous mothers-to-be.

 

She hangs from her net, lazy and gravid

letting it do the work for her,

for she knows that her work is almost done.

October is the Month of Life and Death;

she was not built for cold, and as she spins her sac

she ebbs, fails, and falls into the brown crackling leaves

among the shells of her prey.