Once gigantic spider-like creatures ruled this world. They were as big as lions or gorillas.
The Strangest Things in the World, Thomas R. Henry
Spiders
I don’t kill spiders any more.
For the most part, I ignore them.
When I can, I scoop them up
and I put them outside,
which, depending I suppose
on the variety of spider,
does not always work out
well for them.
At least I can feel comfort
that I was not the mechanism
of their demise. Once that
spider is out in the world
he or she or they is or are
out of my hands. Spiders have
always been good to me,
except for that one time
my wife and I were camping
and love-making and I was
bit right on the ass by
a spider. I did not go to
the hospital but for a moment
or two it was touch and go
while the poison coursed
through my shivering body.
I may have killed a few
more spiders after that,
but at some point I gave it up,
concluding, perhaps, that
as long as I could avoid
murdering a living thing,
I should do it.
Three hundred and fifty
million years ago they say
spiders were as big as lions
or gorillas. If humans
had co-existed with these,
one would hope the lion
and gorilla spiders would
scoop humans up and put
them outside, you know,
if the shoe was on
the other foot.
Sometimes hope is
a stupid thing.
By and large, our spiders
are trustworthy. I know
I’d feel differently in another
part of the world, or millions
of years ago, co-existing with
spiders as big as lions and gorillas.
For now, I will continue
to ignore them or scoop them up
to safety. Like so many other
inexplicable things, it’s just what I do.
michael jarmer 