Spider Songs

As I was leafing through the phone book, I spotted this message from the Hello Answering Service. "Thanks to you, it's been over 75 years."

Finally. Validation for my theory that I led two past lives, one as a newspaper boy from 1917-1931, until I was gunned down in the streets of Chicago by pressuring Capone's righthand man to buy a copy of the Sentinel. 'Come on, Mister." I pleaded. "It's the story of the year!" I yelled the headline: "CAPONE ARRESTED FOR TAX FRAUD! AND HE'S A PUSSY!"

In my second life, 1933-1974 (two-year new life waiting period), I worked as a struggling web page designer. I would gather spiders in the wood, increase their intelligence by dipping them in mercury (pharmacist's instructions), and wait for them to spin pages of elegant poetry. The plan worked beautifully. One of their poems:

Meat with Wings

Hello, Meat with Wings.
How I would like to meet you
to whisper in your ear,
come near, come near.
Love I will bring,
songs I will sing,
as I massage your wings
and caress you, dear.
You are so much more
than Meat with Wings.
Come near, come near.

I gathered their poems for a collection, "64 poems by 8 spiders and a water insect who looks like a spider, and writes more beautifully than the spiders, at least until they ate him".

As the 64th poem was being composed, a young bum knocked on my door and asked if I knew of a place he could stay on that rainy night. Before I could answer, he said "Thanks", walked in with his muddy shoes and fell asleep on my couch.

We chatted when he woke to raid my fridge. He was gone the next day with my spiders and my poems. That bum, Jack Kerouac, stole my life's work, added some drug references, and became famous. I attended all his readings and gave him the evil eye until his death in 1969. I succumbed five years later to toxic poisoning.