A college student looks at a younger brother who is now in high school and still thinks of him as tiny. The speaker describes him as a spider: thin, dangly, with limbs that seem too long for the rest of him. Other people say he has grown, but the speaker brushes that off with a joke, saying they're talking "out of their spinnerets." The speaker even claims to see him through "eight eyes," as if the spider comparison has taken over the whole poem.
Underneath the humor, there's a mix of tenderness and surprise. The speaker's picture of the brother is stuck in the past, and the present doesn't quite fit it. The closing questions turn the lens back on the speaker: was I once gangly and strange-looking too? That gives the ending a gentle, wondering feel. The mood is playful and affectionate, with a small ache about time passing and how hard it is to notice change in someone you love.