POEM: Summer Afternoon

By Zoe Abedon —

My sister is running down the stairs
in front of me,
sees the frog first and lifts
the smooth, green beast between two fingers.
We kneel in the grass
and inspect the ridges around the eyes,
the lines and dashes marking its skin
like a path of stepping stones,
legs ending in fingers delicate as branches.
She stands up and the frog
wriggles in her fingers.
A shock goes through her wrist
and the frog is in the air.
It lands between two trees
in the hammock of a spider web,
A banana spider, with long, sharp legs
each larger than the frog.

The spider moves almost sideways,
sidling towards the intruder,
eyes black and hidden,
the fur of the legs trembling.
I recall the time
my father killed a banana spider
that was sitting on the yellow wall
above my brother’s crib.
This spider has crossed no boundaries.
It is upon the frog and its
legs are embracing it, wrapping
it with incredible speed,
hard abdomen quivering as it works.
Minutes later,
the spider’s body is folded
around the frog, sucking
the marrow from its tightly wrapped body.
My sister turns away,
her hands having been the great influencers.
Everything is shivering,
the spider and the shriveled, pale frog
and the web itself
and my own fingers, which moments before
held something in its greenest stage.

Zoe Abedon is a senior in creative writing at the Charleston County School of the Arts. In the fall, she will matriculate to Duke University. Abedon won a national gold medal for her poem, “Summer Afternoon,” through the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, a global competition for young artists.