Published in 1930 as one of Eliot's Ariel Poems, it is perhaps his most intimate poem of recognition. Eliot himself said plainly that its theme was paternity. The poem draws upon Shakespeare's Pericles, in which Pericles is reunited with his daughter Marina, whom he had believed lost. But Eliot complicates Shakespeare's story by placing it beside another awakening: Seneca's Hercules, who comes out of madness and discovers that he has killed his own children.

After showing Christiana and Mercy the man who spent his life looking downward with a muck-rake instead of upward toward a heavenly crown, the Interpreter led them into another room. At first glance, it seemed empty. Then their eyes found something that made them recoil. High upon the wall clung a large spider. The Interpreter quietly asked, "Is there but one spider in the room?"