the spider and i
by Steve Oehmen
As I opened my eyes, there above me was a giant spider. It was covered in fuchsia and purple fur. It was the size of the moon if I were to lie. Stunned, I muffled my screams in vain.
The creature's eight incandescent eyes turned to me and spoke in a raspy voice, “I’ve come to mourn the mourners, contemplate with the seekers, and drown the obliterated.”
Looking to my left and right, I see rows and rows of the same encounter. A person in distress or some emotional state conversing with one of these deities.
Some of these curators of the escapists come in different forms and shades.
One of these figments was in the shape of a teddy bear, the skin made of evergreen needles in the colors of ultraviolet and pink-blooming dahlia. It was conversing with what I assume was a grieving mother, since she was clutching a stuffed animal. Others took on more of a lovecraftian texture.
Did my fellow masochists and I enter in this amorphous oblivion of our own free will? Just sheep stranded on a burnt gold and rust scaffolding without a base and without an end? A processing line for these sadistic saints to engulf our allegories and alibis? The ether that shades the background of this oblivion is an ever-changing onyx and azure hue. I absorb my surroundings to await the fate.
My own personal overlord begins to approach me. Emitting a low humming sounds as it crawls towards me. It begins to ask me a series of questions in its raspy voice:
Is life the corruption of death?
Is the answer always more questions?
”You will learn one of these answers,” my savior spoke. The vision approached me with each of its legs systematically crossing over each other. Its fuchsia pedipalp slowly reaching out towards me the closer it came.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see the grieving mother locked in an embrace with the evergreen needles teddy bear. The ultraviolet and pink-blooming dahlia needles piercing her flesh as they fully engulf her. During her absolution, the teddy bear began crying neon-lime tears and bellowing loud, mournful howls.
My ignoramus redeemer precedes to slowly extend its rusty orange chelicerae to begin the process of my salvation or disintegration. As I stand here petrified with fear and in denial that this is real, unable to move. This can’t be my reality. I don’t accept it. As I try to wiggle out of this seeming vice grip that has entrenched me in this nightmare. I repeatedly close and open my eyes; ultimately, I can no longer deny this is real.
Shouting at this vision "Why are you doing this to me? I don't deserve this" stopped the onward movement of this symbol of life's capitulation. In its raspy, echoing voice it asks me, “Do you forgive?” I replied, “Yes, let me go, and I will forgive you.” It's monotone reply: “This is not how this works; you must forgive to move on. It's for the best.”
The insurmountable allegory continues its methodical march towards my mental sovereignty. I plead with it that I would do anything it wants; I'll be a better person; I won't step on any spiders anymore or kill flies. This seemed to stop the ongoing track of this plod. “Do you think I am in fact a spider and all other arachnids are my brethren? I am a part of you, and you are my brethren and my creator.”
The howls and ecstasy of these beings, as they circumvent their disciples' independence, flatlines my sanity. This overwhelming despair grows in my petri dish of a mind as this Saint approaches me. The creature's chelicerae starts at my feet, slowly wrapping its mesmerizing silk around them as it spins my paralyzed body. The inconceivable weight of this dreading silk fully engulfs my body and soul.
A weighted sleep rests on my head as a perverse torture crown to elicit my seeping eyes to stay pried open, as my mind searches for an eternal drift.
As my redeemer prepares my body for my own personal absolution, the full depth of the situation consumes me. The hollowness begins in the middle of my rib cage. A pulsating vacuum where once my heart resided is now draining any resolve left in my body. I sorely accept my fate and await the end. I’m at pardonable peace with this realization. Will I emerge from this mystical euphoria to realize I was just talking to shadows on the wall? Will this cure me of the purgatory of grief and move on?
Image for Steve Oehmen
BIO: Steve Oehmen is a published poet. His Haiku poems were recently in the IKUSEI育成NURTURE issue by Quillkeepers Press. He is originally from the south suburbs of Chicago, and currently resides in Indiana. He attended IU East and obtained a bachelor degree in business and works as a medical coder. He also occasionally barks at the moon. No rhyme or reason, just embrace the nonsense.