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Robert Lowell - Mr. Edwards and the Spider
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  I saw the spiders marching through the air,
   Swimming from tree to tree that mildewed day
      In latter August when the hay
      Came creaking to the barn. But where
         The wind is westerly,
   Where gnarled November makes the spiders fly
   Into the apparitions of the sky,
   They purpose nothing but their ease and die
Urgently beating east to sunrise and the sea;

   What are we in the hands of the great God?
   It was in vain you set up thorn and briar
      In battle array against the fire
      And treason crackling in your blood;
         For the wild thorns grow tame
   And will do nothing to oppose the flame;
   Your lacerations tell the losing game
   You play against a sickness past your cure.
How will the hands be strong? How will the heart endure?

   A very little thing, a little worm,
   Or hourglass-blazoned spider, it is said,
      Can kill a tiger. Will the dead
      Hold up his mirror and affirm
         To the four winds the smell
   And flash of his authority? It’s well
   If God who holds you to the pit of hell,
   Much as one holds a spider, will destroy,
Baffle and dissipate your soul. As a small boy

   On Windsor Marsh, I saw the spider die
   When thrown into the bowels of fierce fire:
      There’s no long struggle, no desire
      To get up on its feet and fly
         It stretches out its feet
   And dies. This is the sinner’s last retreat;
   Yes, and no strength exerted on the heat
   Then sinews the abolished will, when sick
And full of burning, it will whistle on a brick.

   But who can plumb the sinking of that soul?
   Josiah Hawley, picture yourself cast
      Into a brick-kiln where the blast
      Fans your quick vitals to a coal—
         If measured by a glass,
   How long would it seem burning! Let there pass
   A minute, ten, ten trillion; but the blaze
   Is infinite, eternal: this is death,
To die and know it. This is the Black Widow, death.
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