A dream: the spider

I have left a gigantic spider in the dirty dishes. I did it initially as a prank, or as some sort of lesson, but now I have left the spider in the dishes for far too long. I am now waiting longer, hoping that the spider will have drowned in the dish water.

The creature is immense: the legs measure a foot at least. This spider has visited me in dreams before--last time, in a cave where I visited my mother. (She was bound to a chair there. No analysis, please.) Then, the spider hung at the cave's entrance, and its legs (many more than eight) writhed above my head. Now only these legs are visible, poking out between plates, floating limp atop the water and the scum. It must be dead by now, I think.

I touch its legs--they writhe slowly in response. This weighs heavily on me, as I placed the spider here myself, and I hoped it would simply die on its own through my negligence. But it has stayed here, head submerged, at the edge of death, and now I must complete the job that won't complete itself.

I take a layer of plates off--the spider's body sits just beneath the water, though there's too much murk and debris to discern the outline. All I can see is the slight undulation of the water as the spider moves. Some of its hair breaks the surface--a patch at the abdomen and a patch at the cephalothorax.

I have in my hand a heavy silver spindle, sharp at the tip. In my brain its purpose is clear; I have since forgotten what it might be used for. But I drive this into the spider's body. This feels like accomplishment; I'm finally addressing my darker corners. I relish my horror--I've earned it.

But the task is not yet complete. I'll need to use a knife. The silver spindle, firmly piercing the spider's body, moves up and down with its heaves. I'm envisioning the plunge of the knife and the cut as I awaken.

And this dream stayed with me all day. The creature was fearful and pitiful, and I had made it myself--through negligence. This I took as didactic. The monsters rise up when you fail to take the knife into your hand at the start of your adventures--or perhaps the monsters arise at the intersection of evil and negligence.

I feel a sense of gratefulness to the dead spider now, and I don't know if this too is a relic of the dream or a product of wakeful reflection. I spent the morning stabbing some of my hoarier spiders, and the horror I felt I'd definitely earned.