When Spring Winds Are Strong, Wolf Spiders Balloon

They’re up on the branch tips, all eight legs en pointe —
one hundred and four chitinous arachnids, their
tutus matching leafless twigs. These spiders parse
every gust, like surfers scoping wind and swell;
desirous wind, wind strong and constant, like
the hot custard disc of June. When it blows
faithful, they hoist their buttocks, as if spiders
actually had buttocks, shooting life-lines of silk
into wind — wind, now a sculptor’s hands, patting
and twirling the silklines into a sail, or is it
a parachute; aeronauts lifting into the air
as if west was the only direction with
a street address, as if wind read their parents
faces, and agreed, only the best days are ahead.

Gary D. Grossman
Streelight Magazine
8 November 2024