spider, spider, gather your corners
come and milk my house dry
keep fly fly out of my soup eye
oil from long wicks curl like ends of eyelashes that peer from curtain back
in the shelf of rooms beyond the opera house
oil from lamps
and steam rising from teapots resting on coals
spider, spider
where are your houses
your months of august and september
your sunrise of mothy webs
the one lonely engineer leans too long outside his window,
his pipe cupping
his hand cupping
his feet banging against the side of brick
a tattoo, tatto
and his love marking time as she codes and recodes
a dash of algebra, a pinch of geometery,
fingers and pencils like tiger tails
back and forth
back and forth
spider
come to my house
and take the corners and under the beds
your children
will travel the length and depth of my house
in my lifetime
