Why I'm Not a Spider (or Why the Name of This Blog Is So Weird)

When I graduated from high school a friend surprised me with a book of poetry: Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Later that summer I opened up the book and was shocked.
Not by the content, but my immediate connection to each line of verse; I didn't know I liked poetry, and the more I read, the more I wanted.
I honestly don't remember studying any Whitman (or any other poet) before this point. This is probably due to my approach to high school studies (find the answer, write it down, move on), and I'm grateful I didn't form any opinions on poetry earlier. Because I didn't read (or don't remember reading) the poems for an assignment, I didn't worry about trying to figure out what they meant. I just let them speak to me. This one became a favorite:

A Noiseless, Patient Spider
By: Walt Whitman

A noiseless patient spider,

I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated,

Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,

It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,

Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you O my soul where you stand,

Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,

Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,

Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,

Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

There is a lot that could be (and has been) written about this poem. When I first read it, I immediately thought, This is me. I am the spider. 
And who isn't? Who doesn't try sending out hopes, dreams, and thoughts into the world, waiting to see where they will fall and who might pick them up.

But lately I haven't wanted to be the noiseless, patient spider anymore.

In fact I've decided to be an entirely different animal: the loud, impatient dragonfly. 

I don't want to wait for my life to come to me; I want to chase it down, grab it in my jaws, and chomp it down in three big gulps. I want to open my wings once, and keep them open, always ready for the next flight. I want eyes that see--really see--everything. I want to be present in each moment, always remembering that life is short, and I am small.

I know silence is golden. I know patience is a virtue.

But after standing isolated on my little promontory, I'm ready to leave my strings behind.

And so the loud, impatient dragonfly leaves the spider behind and takes flight.