Telling the Bees

telling the bees that he is
dead she hesitates, for a
moment, to stop them in their
ordinary work (that so graces

their table) but this old custom,
one dear to him, she will keep
at this very last, lest they
should decamp for other hives

or, at the worst, die

so, she tells them of his dying,
early that morning, before the
dawn cracked the new day open,
light creeping over the hills

until it could not be dismissed in
favor of that particular rest graced
to caretakers and, telling them,

she feels their very hum
in her blood, the sun noon-high
now, the windows opened, the
priest called for, the clothes

of black pressed and ready, and
still they hum, these engines of
industry, toiling amongst their
thicksweet gold, their summer harvest