Elinor Ann Walker
Image by Yaseminmsl from Pexels
Elinor Ann Walker (she/her) holds a Ph.D. in English from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, lives near the mountains, and prefers to write outside. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in such journals as Bracken, Cherry Tree, Hayden's Ferry Review, Jet Fuel Review, Nimrod International Journal, Northwest Review, Pirene's Fountain, Plant-Human Quarterly, Plume, and The Southern Review, among others. She has recently completed a full-length manuscript of poetry and two chapbooks. Find her online at https://elinorannwalker.com.
Honey
The bees are in the chimney walls
where they’ve been for 20 years or more,
their soft bodies moving as one.
My cousin who no longer speaks to me said
it’s been that way as long as he remembers.
He called the site the old homeplace.
He used to say I should try to get down there
soon. I doubt I’ll ever wander that dirt road.
But I imagine the spaces where the stones
vibrate with the bees’ urgent making,
and honey oozes where mortar
loosens. They say you can actually see it.
I doubt I’ll ever press my hand there
on a resinous brick and feel the thrum
of fanning wings. Not mine, that music.
I covet royal jelly, the queen’s share,
her colony-dependence. Wax chambers
are as convoluted as family history.
I think of the bees searching for nectar
wherever they can find it, trading pollen.
Worker bees often die while foraging.
Sweetness dissipates in air like fragrance.
The house is no longer there. Foundation,
just a square of stones. Conversations,
drawn like curtains billowing emptiness.
But the chimney stands, a sentinel, still
and full of creation. Those bees, those bees
I can practically hear in my head.
Estrangement is thick and viscous
and stops up my throat like honey.
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