A Dream

James Whitcomb Riley 1849 (Greenfield) – 1916 (Indianapolis)



I dreamed I was a spider;
A big, fat, hungry spider;
A lusty, rusty spider
With a dozen palsied limbs;
With a dozen limbs that dangled
Where three wretched flies were tangled
And their buzzing wings were strangled
In the middle of their hymns.

And I mocked them like a demon--
A demoniacal demon
Who delights to be a demon
For the sake of sin alone;
And with fondly false embraces
Did I weave my mystic laces
Round their horror-stricken faces
Till I muffled every groan.

And I smiled to see them weeping,
For to see an insect weeping,
Sadly, sorrowfully weeping,
Fattens every spider's mirth;
And to note a fly's heart quaking,
And with anguish ever aching
Till you see it slowly breaking
Is the sweetest thing on earth.

I experienced a pleasure,
Such a highly-flavored pleasure,
Such intoxicating pleasure,
That I drank of it like wine;
And my mortal soul engages
That no spider on the pages
Of the history of ages
Felt a rapture more divine.

I careened around and capered--
Madly, mystically capered--
For three days and nights I capered
Round my web in wild delight;
Till with fierce ambition burning,
And an inward thirst and yearning
I hastened my returning
With a fiendish appetite.

And I found my victims dying,
'Ha!' they whispered, 'we are dying!'
Faintly whispered, 'we are dying,
And our earthly course is run.'
And the scene was so impressing
That I breathed a special blessing,
As I killed them with caressing
And devoured them one by one.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 21, 2023

1:18 min read
75

Quick analysis:

Scheme AAABCCCB DDDEFGGE HHHIHHHI AAAJFGGJ CCCKHHHK HHHDHHHD
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,413
Words 261
Stanzas 6
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8

James Whitcomb Riley

James Whitcomb Riley was an American writer, poet, and best-selling author. During his lifetime he was known as the "Hoosier Poet" and "Children's Poet" for his dialect works and his children's poetry respectively. more…

All James Whitcomb Riley poems | James Whitcomb Riley Books

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