My blue rain boots slick against 
the downed autumn foliage,
stomping down leaf- that clings to the heel of my boot 
like a missing poster.
I crouch to where I’ve left her,
bound in her epiphany, 
cleaved to the edge of her spider world,
haunted in the way all things are haunted.
Her wickered legs, woven around her precious cargo,
a basket- protecting what I have ultimately already ended.
I lift her offspring up to the sky, a lamb on a pillar of fire, 
burning its way up to gods I don’t know
The soft shell breaks open across the land in front of me,
the webbed, darling scraps of her work, 
flutter in the invisible wind,
the galaxy she strung like dark necklace on a thousand threads,
each glass-like bead, sounding against the floor,
a church bell rung twice,
the sparkling opening to a child’s song,
an egg 
smacked down hard against the edge of the universe,
letting the insides
curl 
into fetal position.