What is '10 legs, 8 broken'? The spider poem that's got TikTok emotional

TikTok is a platform where people can share their creativity, and most recently a video with a poem about spiders has gone viral as it has hit people in the feels.

The poem titled "Ten Legs, Eight Broken," is all about a wounded spider where at first it reads from the perspective of the human that was scared of it, before changing to the POV of the spider that notes if it looked different then it wouldn't have been wounded by the human.

In the 16-photo slideshow, the poem was posted by user @user68519586 that often posts different poems on their profile, and in this case "Ten Legs, Eight Broken" received over 6m views, 1.1m likes and 24,000 comments.

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The post also became the most-played recent post underneath the sound for Emile Mosseri's song "Jacob and the Stone," according to Know Your Meme.

So what is the "10 legs, 8 broken" poem?

Here is "Ten Legs, Eight Broken" in full:

"To the spider,
the shadowed creature in the corner of the room
i hate you.
You scared me just as your brothers and sisters did before you,
and i will tell you what i told them,
You are a trespasser that does not belong here.
You entered without knocking.
Roamed freely like this is your home and decorated my walls with unwanted, silk webs without asking.
You may not be the only killer here, but only one of us is innocent,
and it's not you.
The spider says to me, it's brittle body squashed and dying,
It's not you, either.
There is venom infused in my fang-shaped maws,
but i was born this way.
What's your excuse?
If you could count your murders, how long would you be counting?
Am i really this threatening?
I thought human hearts were bigger that mine, but you have killed with malice instead of marrow of your bones and poison bubbling behind your scowl
And i'm sorry for scaring you,
but i didn't know being seen would cost me my life.
Maybe
If you didn't fabricate the prickly feeling of my legs creeping upon your skin while I crawled across the living room floor,
If the webs I weaved were made of cotton candy and captured clementines, cherries, and sweet peas rather than struggling wings and blood;
If i had a pink tongue, push fur, a wagging tail, and fur legs instead of eight
If i had only two eyes, and they were glittering stars and not supermassive block holes;
If i was the same but looked different;
maybe you wouldn't hate me.
Maybe you wouldn't have loved me, either, and maybe you still wouldn't have let me stay,
but maybe you would've shown me the door or a window.
Maybe you would've shown me mercy.
(But you are still standing, and I am still sorry).
I think
maybe,
no matter how reluctant,
mercy would've been enough."

Since posting the poem, it has evoked a strong reaction from viewers who have posted a number of TikTok's in response, with people even warning others not to read it as it is too emotional.

Despite warning people in a video not to read the poem, TikTok Kat added in the caption: "Actually do bc I don't kill spiders but now i DEFINITELY will never."

While @skittitybababoo noted how she's "been crying over these f****** spider poems all night."

TikToker Lily (@lebeanlily) can be seen crying in a video where she added a quote from the poem as onscreen text before insisting in the caption: "I'm never killing a spider ever again," which received 706,000 views.

Elsewhere, others responded to the poem with humour like TikToker Piper (@piper8125) who posted a video of a spider caught and trapped in a glass where she wrote: "F** this poem."

Another TikToker @sh00ting.starzzz noted how strongly they associate the poem with Emile Mosseri's song "Jacob and the Stone," Jacob and the Stone," which was used in the original video.

TikToker @mysketcherslightup noted how the poem made her think twice about killing spiders.

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