The Sweet Sound Of Bees

by T. E. Ballard

Could you love a bee
that buzzed, tickled your ear,
brought tiny legs up to lips,
while amber honey dripped
down your breast?
And if he followed it there
carried it down
to the place where you open
like flowers, clear petals. If wings
grew tongues, and he said
you were enough
the very essence of you
that he could live, grow
in the sweet sugar of your hip.

Would you then turn and walk away?
Say he is not a man with legs,
speak of spiders or ants
who would deny you both a place.
What if these were not reasons
just something you said,
for the hum had grown so sweet,
you realized an ability to sting.