The Tangled Webs We Weave

Our Real God: The Spider King

by Melissa Holm

Loops interwoven, tangled webs unseen—

Still, we feel them:

Sticky, tethered things.

We pull them off.

The spider runs free.

Sometimes, we spot him—

but we won’t be the ones to stop him.

To do that would mean admitting

our secrecy.

And how uncomfortable

these tethers feel on me.

So instead,

we spin our web a little tighter—

hide the strands from view,

lie about them,

cry about them

in secret.

Pretend to just let it be.

But we don’t.

We repress

our dark, twisted mess,

and plot Count of Monte Cristo

revenge schemes.

Hoping no one sees us unclean.

Hoping no one exposes

the shadowed knots we keep unseen.

We lie

when asked about the bigger thing,

smiling like some espionage queen.

We feel everything.

And we place our defense stakes

under whispered breath breaks,

aimed at the people

we quietly blame—

those cast in our

“downfall” frame—

those who threaten

our hidden, sacred dream.

That dream:

the most beautiful, delicate,

kaleidoscopic part

of this whole life thing.

So I ask:

Do you hate me?

Would you date me?

Are you even curious to know me?

Would you take the time to show me

that you see me?

That you know me—

secretly?

Is your conscious mind

tethered to mine?

Is your subconscious web

interwoven with mine?

Is your unconscious thread

entangled in mine—

invisible, but intertwined?

No one really wants

to stop the spider’s weave.

We respect him.

He’s our God.

We worship him

with human sacrifice—

our silent greed,

our masked deceit,

our unmet need.

We let his strings

pull through our seams,

entangled in the shadows

of broken human dreams.

We are slaves

to what we won’t name.

And what does every human need?

We forget:

if we spoke with authenticity,

our inner fire

could burn through the chains—

those forged from bloodshed,

blame,

and borrowed names—

the tangled web

of shadow games

we play

to feed

our human need.

But if we did,

we’d be free.

And freedom

is the truest human need

we all secretly bleed.

But before our coup d’état—

we must allow ourselves to truly be seen.

We, the shadowed-light king queens,

must finally arrive

on the scene—

With full acceptance,

by all,

in everything.

Can we?

So let’s turn on the spider king.

Let him swing

in a noose

of his own thread—

the same thread

where our hearts have bled.

Let truth be the flame.

Let fire reclaim.

Let the web burn down

in our name.

Let’s take his crown—

and squish him down.

Replace his webs

with our kaleidoscope dream:

the only true, beautiful thing

of this

human

thing.