The Winter Web

He spent the first days of autumn,

Constructing the most beautiful home,

Using principles of arches and anchors,

Strategically to last his lifetime.

I must confess I questioned,

The location he chose to build.

A loner I thought, away from others,

To live above my stove.

How did he know, I later wondered,

About the unexpected arrival

Of so many flies in my kitchen?

He was a rancher, a housefly baron.

One step on his sticky doorway,

Rang the homeowner’s bell…

Each fly greeted in lightning speed,

Then wrapped and packaged for a meal.

As autumn chilled to winter,

The farmer’s bounty became scarce.

I found myself searching window sills,

For insects to toss in his web.

The homesteader moved into a corner,

The highest, away from it all.

Winter ended his elegant lifestyle

Gradually he ceased to move and withered.

“He knows he’s starving”,  I told myself.

“But only humans know they die”.

How presumptuous was I to think

The spider wasn’t as smart as I?

Post script:
 The little guy kept disappearing for days and  weeks at a time and I thought he was gone. His web was no longer intact and catching any food was impossible. Every time I would look for him and he was gone, I thought him dead, only to see him out and about days later. This morning I saw he had fallen from the ceiling onto the stove top and was officially dead. This teaspoon wielding gravedigger, buried him in the garden and I actually cried. Every loss is getting increasingly difficult. RIP 11 21 14