To the Spigot, To the Spider

At sunset one summer evening I stepped outside to enjoy the summer evening’s sunset and water the garden plants that were dying in the draught. So I made my way towards the hose spigot at the back of the house, and as I marveled at the purple sunset a dark writhing Figure appeared before my eyes, eclipsing the sun and stopping me dead in my tracks. It was not a dragon. It was not a Ringwraith. It was a Spider, a huge Spider, busily at work crafting an enormous web two yards across, spanning the forest to the bushes, His labor diligent and instinctual like that of a master craftsman. There I stood, marveling at Its pained yet natural movements, wondering when some bird or wasp would descend upon the Thing and rip out the Ugliness from the otherwise perfect scene. But when I shifted my point of view and the Spider no longer tarnished the backdrop of the sunset I noticed It disappeared into the shadows around It and would have been invisible to all but the sharpest of eagle eyes. And as I blustered through an invisible strand of the webbing, exciting the Demon even further, I knew that the Thing must go. But how? I knew how. I would give to It the same thing that I meant to give the garden plants, for no terrestrial creature can long withstand the force of water. So I unscrewed the spigot, marched around the other side of the house to grab the hose, and walked back to the spot where I spotted the Spider. But in my absence the Spider, too, had taken Its leave and I wondered if Nature was not made for men to marvel at, or if in those moments Nature does but laugh at us.