crawling along the tiled window sill.
Now I value spiders as predators on the flies
which often infest my indoor flower plants
and I watched with interest to see what it was doing.
But I couldn't tell where it was going or why.
It halted when it came level with the sink
and turned to face over the edge of the sill.
Motionless it seemed to be peering down
as if on a cliff above the rocks below.
Still it didn't move. Taking time to think?
Decide? Oh, my god, a suicide?
Surely there's some pleasure still to come
in life. Family somewhere? Friends? Or none !
Don't do it. You're so tiny. You'll never survive.
Or is that part of the problem? An inferiority . . .
And then it jumped. But horizontally !
Across the gap between the sill and the cloth
draped over the tall vertical water faucet.
Before it vanished in the fabric, I swear its jaws
moved. I think it said "Up yours".