Dream Of The Sub-Saharan Spider

It is noonday on this hot, dry sandy plain as I crawl through the scrubby short grass toward my destination.  This is unusual for me, I am rarely seen in daytime, and never in any other part of the Sahara.  I am as nocturnal as my ancestors were for millions of years.  Yet here I am, out with the sun so dangerous to me, struggling to follow the scent of water riding on air currents coming from the high Africian mountains.  I have been forced from my deep-woods home early in the year by those seeking more wood and clear space.  But all I can focus on is my destination where I know I shall find water and shelter:  The Mountains of the Moon.

No human knows my name.  I have yet to be seen, and will go extinct before ever being discovered.   My closest cousin is the giant wolf-spider of the Ivory Coast.  Nomadic tribes who have passed through this place have never seen evidence of my existence.  Hopefully, death will come swiftly for me on wings I shall not see in time to scatter away, and the large birds that feast on my kind are also shrinking in number, for their main prey is disappearing fast.  Those who steal the forest seem heedless of all life but their own. 

They shall not prosper.