fall buzz

Sheltered from the strong midday autumn sun, I stand under the old wooden pavillion by the bay and look at the large sunflower heads, baskets of homemade lavendar soap, pie pumpkins, spotted pears, and apples arranged on the picnic table before me. The market is humming with activity; nearby a baker trades a loaf of zuccinin bread for a pumpkin, and two figures huddle over the largest turnip I have ever seen, negociating a price.

Fishing around in the heavy bag slung over my left forearm, I come up with a ginger crisp apple. After the satisfying first chomp, the sweet juice runs down my wrist. Almost immediately, a bee is perched on my apple, hungrily lapping up the sugars in the exposed part that I bit. I do a little dance there, spinning and blowing and gently waving the apple about, hoping that this wild ride would make the bee less interested. But no, he was loving it. The more I danced, the more it seemed that he was relishing my apple.

I knew that this bee would not sting me. Even though my epi pen was over a mile away across the bay, I did not take any further measures to rid myself of this unwelcome companion.

Then I went home and thought about the situation and wrote this poem:

On the Contentedness of Bees in Autumn

in spring when there is nothing but the melting snow and the bare brown twigs and life ready to exhale

there is no flower for the bee to buzz in so he comes after me and I puff up

the summer makes them greedy with blooms to fight over and nests to gaurd and I tend to my own business

they sting me anyway for being and i puff up

summer days get shorter and blackberries ripen and i gather heavy friuts and the branches bounce back and there are the bees consumed in their work

this time i am stung only by thorns

finally autumn comes and i bite into that first crispy apple and juice runs down my wrist and my hands are sticky and sweet and bees come wildly swarming around me like a halo

and we are happily drunk with the joy of autumn together