There’s a seventy pound beehive
deep inside a wall of my house.
Bees flow in and out the window,
a swarm of breeze dancing
throughout the day.
We must get rid of them.
Gas them or do it the humane way:
cut into the wall, suck them into a vacuum,
release them, miles away, into a stranger’s hive.
My mother used to cover her ears
with her hands when a bee buzzed by.
It could get inside your brain and die,
she told me when I was five.
A bee followed me down the street today.
We want to come out alive, she told me.
Do you know why bees die after they sting?
Massive abdominal ruptures. The impact
blows open their stomachs, like a gunshot.
In the secret afterlife of bees there are markings
on the trees: We had no idea it would kill us,
no idea we were risking our lives.