To walk through the jungle of Pahang
is to walk in a dream.
All around
the hidden crowded noisy
life goes on
macaws shriek
monkeys chatter
through the treetops
but within my steaming
green shadowed dome
there is only stillness
and an alien presence.

Hunched fist-size in the center
of her dew-beaded web
a spider watches
glowing in colors
gaudier
than the wayside orchids
scattered over the ankle deep
blanket of mist.

Do I haunt her dreams
as she haunts mine
waiting in queenly loneliness
at the turn of a jungle path
in Malaya?