Monhegan grows some huge spiders. I'm told that most of the monsters I've come across out here are garden spiders, "like Charlotte." That still doesn't prevent me from shivering a little each time I come across one, which is often. In the morning when the dew is on the webs, you can easily see how many spiders have set up shop, their webs strewn among the spruce boughs like scraps of the finest lace. In a barberry bush next to the entrance to one building, four giant spiders with bodies the size and shape of strawberries have woven their webs, one behind the other. Last night when the spiders were on their webs and the strands shone, it gave the little colony an eerie three-dimensional effect. The owner of the inn is fond of one right outside her office window. She says she sometimes watches her (as with falcons, the female is larger than the male)for long periods of time instead of working. I can admire their handicraft and their good work keeping down the fly population, though I don't want to get too close to the creatures themselves. The other night a spider the size of a small rodent crept across the porch. Funny how I wouldn't have been bothered if it had been a mouse, but it being a spider freaked me out.

Complacent spider
oblivious to my fear
mends her perfect web.