Eight Legs

By Mabry Sansbury

There is a spider in my bedroom.

She watches through the window 

As my neighbor mows his lawn.

He takes a drag of his

Cigarette 

And pauses,

Drinking in the trail of dead grass

Strewn in his wake.

He lives alone,

Though not by choice.

When he was a younger man,

He imagined being held

By someone with soft hands

Who would breathe through the night

And cry when he

Inevitably

Left her behind

For a greener fence. 

She would shake herself to pieces for him.

She would run until her lungs gave out.

She would brave her fear of heights and

Fly

Just to watch him grieve 

A life that could’ve been.

And when she gets to that house

And its blackened fences,

My hand comes down on the glass,

And the eight-legged thing

On my bedroom window 

Dies as she began.

She oozes.

She bends.

She breaks apart.