a poem prompt suggested by someone very special

there is a spider in the room.

it has always been there, perched in the quietest corner spinning secrets into its delicate web.

it does not scuttle, does not flee when noticed—

no, it stays. it lingers. it waits.

a silent witness to every sigh, every forgotten dream, every midnight thought that should have faded, but never quite did.

some take a broom to it, swatting at silk and shadow,

chasing it from the rafters with trembling hands.

they light candles, open windows, whisper spells of forgetting—

but the spider only watches, amused, spinning itself whole again.

for every thread unraveled, it weaves another.

for every door slammed, it finds a crack.

for every name unspoken, it hums it back in the hush of night.

you cannot sweep away what was always meant to stay. you cannot banish what has made a home in you.

for some, it is the house they never left,

its walls breathing stories they no longer wish to hear.

for others, it is a name that lingers on their lips,

a face they see in strangers,

a voice that hums in their quietest hours.

some spiders weave with lost possibilities,

golden threads of what could have been—

a path untaken, a door closed too soon,

a dream that outgrew its dreamer.

but we all carry a spider.

some call it a shadow.

some call it fate.

some never dare to call it anything at all.

it follows us from room to room,

perches on our shoulders, tucks itself into our chests.

it hums in the hush of twilight,

it watches from the corner of every empty space.

it is always there, the spider in the room.

not always feared, not always welcome—

but always, always home.

— Lux