Here
By Jenny Zeltmann

For a week the spider has lived
on the walls of this house.
I did not call for her death
as I usually would,
recruiting my father to do the dirty work
for which fathers are made.
Instead
I let her live.
I charted her progress
across the second story hallway,
and the night that she met me in my bathroom
I noted her presence:
a black star against the white
sky of shower.
I nodded, brushed my teeth,
turned out the light, surrendered to
the clean sheets of my bed.
All night long I dreamt of
webs I might spin,
bathroom acrobatics when all the house is sleeping
and this might be the last chance
to dance on silk and moonlight.
I imagined her streaming across
ceiling and sink, tub and toilet,
weaving her crystal curtain.
It was a death shroud:
In the morning I found her hanging,
near lifelessness,
in front of the mirror.
Why be surprised?
There is nothing for her here,
she'll starve,
and the brief art of her heart's instinct
will go unappreciated -
worse -
deliberately destroyed,
simply because it didn't fit,

even though it is the only way she knows to live.