I like bees, and creatures in general. Tiny and huge, big and small, minuscule and all-I learn from them all. And as my next door neighbor has a bee hive house. I decided to write a quick poem about my experience of the bees and birds coming in and out of our daily life, and what metaphors they always remind me of: bees know community, hawks solitude and hummingbirds know color theory, was my quick observation today, as I listened through creatures….

The kingdom of bees exist

Beside my house.

My next door neighbor’s painted white bee hive haven house

Welcomes them in-

With perfect bee-shaped carved openings-

Keeps em coming and going, alight all day-buzzing away, just being bees…

Climbing on top of one another to do what they already are like mini trees.

No doorbells, just a noisy but contained invitation, for their slow withdrawing of wings,

Which causes an air-stirred irritation/ invitation, each time they enter in again, like a single violin string in wind.

Then, again today, two

Neon green chested

Hummingbirds suddenly join in that buzzing chorus, out of sheer

Curiosity I presume. They fly nearly into getting caught in my long wet hair

In search of color and wonder

At the constant communion of those bees.

Or maybe, the color yellow itself confuses them

As glory blinds our eyes at certain points of day.

A Cooper’s hawk overhead, in its way,

Can wait all day, hovering in circles, for one swoop at a Vole or mouse by dusk.

But in my house, the tiny generations of bees beside me

Making their honey as a by-product of just being

Makes the land around me seem more yellow

And communal today.

I must get out and be near friends!

This gives me room to consider

How close to be

To things to know them well-like hummingbirds know color

Or bees one another’s potential honey,

As the first kibbutz, they must be,

In the kingdom of bees.

So are we. The one to come,

Which is somehow here already

Today.