Hedge Life






Overnight the spiders had washed their webs and hung them out to dry on the hedge.

I imagine spiders with pegs, with silk aprons and peg pockets and curlers in their hair.
While the webs blow on the line they brew pots of coffee and settle at a table with a piece of bluebottle toast.

But the butterflies! They seem drunk on life, bumping in-out of leaves, slurring their flight, waving their bright wings. Have they been dancing all night? Are their shoes all worn through?

They will knock over the spiders’ best china, barging about like that.

The spiders seem stoic about it.
Life is a gamble, they say, and thumb through their cookbooks.




Comments

Dixie@dcrelief said…
Love this and now, I want a cup of coffee, Lisa!!
12 September 2015 at 10:15
Geo. said…
I love your imaginative tableau. Nearly stepped on a huge wolf spider in the pumphouse last night. Caught her with a cup and card and set her under the hedge. Spiders are peaceful neighbors but do like to visit indoors unannounced.
12 September 2015 at 20:28
Lisa Southard said…
I'm drinking coffee now but not brewed by spiders :-)
13 September 2015 at 09:30
Lisa Southard said…
They like to surprise us. They favour our bathroom as a hangout and I actually feel lonely if there's no arachnids to chat to while I shower. My social life is odd...
13 September 2015 at 09:37
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Beginnings, Halloween 2022

Image
Today I was stuck, briefly, in traffic. Gulls were keening, a sound that goes into my soul in a good way. When did I last sit to listen to the gulls? I've been busy with good things but oh my! I am tired. I knew that I was tired this time, I have been taking more breaks, resting up, allowing myself to miss our Dog, and clearly, I had better keep doing this. I always think a quick respite will do; sometimes one needs a stretch of rest. I keep writing. Writing can be done in gentle accruals and then becomes an activity that can feed me back. I did not write a Halloween story though, not even a comforting one, instead, I am keeping the tradition of sharing some writing with you, Dear Readers. Below are two extracts from the peripherals of the novel I am slowly completing; the first is a prequel that I wrote for my own guidance so probably will not be included in the final edit, the second is an attempt at describing the story, which will probably be rewritten over and over until the
Read more

The Never-Ending Shed Story: Part Two

Image
Day 8: We waited for cooler hours before loading up the van, intent on finishing the shed build. The Shed Saga finale! We were optimistically wrong, of course, though the roof felt was tacked down, and both the fascia and the perched diamond of finial were drilled in. The field grass was looking parched, it was the colour of wheat biscuits. Crickets chirped- they always sound merry. We were hot and sticky like two marinated chunks. ‘It looks like a shed,’ we observed, surprised. ‘We should get the doors hinged!’ But our stomachs were growling and we were clumsy-tired. The doors would have to be another adventure. Meanwhile, it was time for cooking burgers in the van, for getting our stable sofa bed ready for a well-earned sleep, for setting up one table and two chairs under the sweep of the ash tree, looking down across the lower field as the sun dipped behind us and the nearly-full pink-faced moon rose up from the tree line on the opposite hill. We fetched out our reclining chairs, im
Read more

Back From The Future Blog Party

Image
Another joint blog adventure- if you want to see who else said what the list of participants is here . The premise is this: 'You're up before dawn on a Saturday when the doorbell rings. You haven't brewed your coffee so you wonder if you imagined the sound. Plonking the half-filled carafe in the sink, you go to the front door and cautiously swing it open. No one there. As you cast your eyes to the ground, you see a parcel addressed to you ... from you. You scoop it up and haul it inside, sensing something legitimate despite the extreme oddness of the situation. Carefully, you pry it open. Inside is a shoebox -- sent from ten years in the future -- and it's filled with items you have sent yourself. What's in it?' Here's how I imagined it: Before dawn? Shadows outside, first forming. Sleep has gone, I don't know where. Coffee I can find. All the way from Machu Pichu, this fair-traded pack. Scissors are in the drawer, which
Read more