appleseed and bugs were his
bookends tucked up high in the corners
they had his back while he sat on
the pot
they hung suspended watching him
before the mirror at the sink as he shaved and brushed this teeth
they withstood his breath bellow quiver their webs and heard his crisp Good mornings Whassup What are
you cannibals living off of
each had the remains of a desiccated spider(mate?) tacitly hanging beside them he thought
like a head on a pike to throw fierce warningBeware! a visual terror
but the house was closed up
for cold weather there wasnt and wouldnt be intruders or an abundance of prey yet they fervently maintained their webs their
stealthy stillness and perhaps a belief in an arachnid god who provided or denied
he would have facilitated
provisions but he did not know what they preferred
he left them to their maker who
incited them to enter the house wend their way into the bathroom scale the walls
and inhabit their corner of the world
appleseed had been around longest
she spied his lengthy discomfort watched him soak in hot baths of
Epsom salt scented with lavender oil crawling into them and out again watched
his ministrations his slender comfort among all his discomforts
bugs appeared in the last two
months and smartly stayed away from appleseed
they were his silent wary
companions mute and absolute not complaining in their existence as he did in his own
maybe together they were the
vanguard of something unseen maybe or maybe hed miss them when they were gonemaybe theyd miss him when he was
gone
such is the way of species dissimilar but similar
his web was his unseen influence
of those who appreciated him or who he confounded
he really didnt know
the spiders were solitary beasts
he believed if they could say
theyd say as he did Being alive wasnt the same as being lonely which is what he told his family and friends
who chided him that he was lonely whether he admitted it or not
Ah they were full of horseshit they hedged his
bet that their aloneness was lonely otherwise they wouldnt try to project it onto him he was too fraught with thoughts too active in mind and dreams
to miss human interaction and its often banality
he was antisocial
he was too busy being to worry
being among others
except
his silent sidekicks
and he theirs
appleseed and bugs
morning, Friday,
2 12. 16
