The backyard is humming with honey bees.
The photinia hedge is a mass of clustered,
tiny, white flowers. If you were here, I’d tease
you & say, “The word’s out about your knees
being the bee’s knees” & you’d have hiked
up your skirt to prove I was right
& we’d have agreed
because of your sexy knees a crazed swarm
of bees lifted you into the highest branches
of a nearby Sycamore tree to enshrine
your knees in wax, making it impossible for you
to escape. You feigned a damsel-in-distress call
like the Edward Gorey drawn woman
in the opening sequence
of Masterpiece Mystery Theatre
& I bravely climbed up and saved you
despite being stung hundreds of times
& once you were safe & I lay swollen in the bed
your knees on either side of my hips
you’d have treated me with your honey remedy.
