Spider Bait

I’d seen her wander along the street

A number of times, or more,

And know I should have approached her then

But she might have said, ‘what for?’

I could have asked for a date, but then

I left it much too late,

And saw her then with a guy called Ben,

But he looked like spider bait.

He had a straggly beard and hair

That stood up straight in spikes,

I don’t know what she could see in him

For my first response was ‘Yikes!’

His frame was thin and all caving in

And his clothes were contrabands,

But he clutched at her with a bony paw,

With hair on the back of his hands.

She went to stay at his cottage, which

Was set at the edge of the wood,

More of a tumbledown shack, I thought,

Not right for that neighbourhood,

It lay half-hidden between the trees

With their foliage hanging down,

You had to push past the bushes that

Enclosed the whole surround.

She’d sit out on the verandah with

The sun about to set,

While I would creep in around there

For a glimpse of her, Colette.

I thought, perhaps if she saw me there

She might come out to see,

And once I’d managed to talk to her

She’d fall in love with me.

But Ben would never let go of her

Nor let her out of his sight,

He kept her there by the spiders that

Would weave their webs each night,

From every dangling branch there hung

An orb web in the breeze,

And in each centre a spider that

Would make Colette’s blood freeze.

I think he must have been breeding them

He seemed to take delight,

In pointing out how the thousands seemed

To weave there every night,

Then she began to withdraw from him

And refuse his coarse demands,

Whenever he went to reach for her

With his scrawny, hairy hands.

The webs ballooned and they hit the roof

Formed a blanket from the trees,

They covered the little cottage and

I heard her frightened pleas,

She couldn’t leave the verandah though 

She said she’d have to go,

He said that he was a spider man,

And that’s when I heard his ‘No!’

She didn’t come out again for days

And I heard her cry at night,

‘I hate this place, and I hate your face,’

But he said, ‘You’re my delight.’

A week went by and I heard her sigh,

The last sound that she made,

So I burst through all the gossamer webs

With an old and rusty blade.

He was knelt beside her form supine

In the corner of the room,

While she was wrapped in gossamer fine

And looked like a large cocoon,

I lashed out with the rusty blade

And cut off his evil head,

When thousands of spiders scurried out

From his neck, and over the bed.

I cut her out of the tight cocoon

And peeled it back from her face,

She hugged me in the gathering gloom

And said, ‘Let’s leave this place.’

I’d like to say that she went with me

But I’d left my run too late,

‘I’ll never look at a man again

Since he made me spider bait.’

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[Tony Jordan]

He's made a friend for life - having saved hers. Not the most welcome outcome for our hero - seems he deserved more but at least he learned he is brave - maybe even brave enough to approach some maidens who havent suffered arachnid PTSD.
Good luck to him.
Great gory imagery DLP !!