begun, then the idea of a word, then the idea

itself, each bee

its cipher, a tiny letter hanging above the blackboard,

the parade of vowel &

consonant, its own contagious song.

Blind Huber (ix)

Scarlet fever, desperate hush—

as a child, it hurt more

to open my mouth, to ask for the cold

cloth,

than to be still. Unearthly still,

my body hung an inch

over my body, I could feel my heat rise.

To walk away I had to trade my eyes.

They ache at times still

when unexpectantly I come upon myself

sopping beneath a sheet.

Blind Huber (x)

Lilac-drunk, in the garden I will never

see, I wonder about

the queen, her mystery. Burnens

seizes the whole bees of both hives,

searching her out. On the second

of July, the weather being very

fine, numbers of males left,

& we set at liberty a young virgin….

Mere sound, mere

sensation, I put my mouth to the hive, promise

their queen will return, though it’s not

my charge. Each

morning, before the dew lifts, they cover my head—

jeweled statue. The queen

has the answer. What are they doing now? I ask.

Crawling over each other,

walking in circles, Burnens replies.

Wax Father

Each day

the son came for more, scraping comb

freshly laid, kneeling

apologetic. The father had

collapsed, the boy

wasn’t ready, so he built a replica of the old man

in order to save him. When

the legs gave out he fashioned legs,

when the hands began to tremble

he fashioned hands,

& as the fever spread he made a head. At the

bedside, he studied the creases edging

his father’s eyes, the bones pressing up from the cheeks,

the places the skull

turned inward. The lungs filled—

he built a torso. As he finished

each limb, each organ, he carried it to the church

& pinned it above the altar, until nearly

his entire body hung there.

Blind Huber (xi)

Empty box, handful of

bees—in a few days

a city, the exact city in a hundred

boxes. Take your dead

father’s hand, as the shadow of the earth

blots out the sun. A telescope

pulls the planets closer

but aren’t they close enough?

Statuary

Our dying does not fill the hive

with the stench

of dying, our bodies

powder, our bodies

the vessel & the vessel

empties.

Outside

the world hungers.

A cockroach, stung,

can be removed.

A careless child

forced a snail inside with a stick once.

We waxed over the orifice of its shell

sealing the creature in. And here,

the cellar of the comb,

a mouse,

driven in by winter & lack.

Its pawing woke us.

Even twitching it reeked—worse

the moment it stopped.

Now every day

we crawl over it

to pass outside,

the wax form of what was

staring out, its airless sleep,

the mouse we built

to warn the rest from us.

Blind Huber (xii)

Thus transfixed, stare blank at one

immovable thing, ocean