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The Heart Hive illustration by Alé Mercado

In darkness, the bees fill my head with their buzzing.
A ceaseless fanning of wings, a clambering.
And in fever pitch, my own wings begin to whir.

I follow her in her waltz.
The Honey Bee.
Her purring wings a silver blur;
With subtle movements she directs my flight,
Weaving between skyscrapers of trees, rustling leaves;
Though forests of hemlock, lily-white;
Over rivers in sun-sparkled streams,
To spiral into the hive.

As darkness falls, the humming swells.
The air throbs with heat and noise
Carried on a cool breeze by fanning bees—
Silver glints of wing flash in the dim.
The air is heavy with that sticky sweet smell.
She climbs across the combs—
Hexagons seeping honey, nectar,
Over empty cells and brood cells,
Capped with white wax.

Dozens of bodies press,
Passing over and around.
The humming is enthralling,
Hypnotic.
I imagine the heartbeat of every bee in the hive.
Pounding,
Coursing,
The whole hive seems to shake,
Throb,
Pulsate.
The heart-hive sings with the blood of thousands of bees,
And they dance neatly across the web of nature.
If they were to falter,
The threads would fall,
But I trust in weavers such as these.