Wild Bees

Across the street
from our first apartment
a catalpa tree grew
stout and three stories tall
with a hole halfway up
its trunk where bees flew
in and out spring to fall.
Sixteen summers have flown
since I last looked out
our windows on the second floor
to see that tree, to see
if I could see the bees.
Since then one empire
has fallen, and one has grown
more violent and vile.
There have been many wars:
machetes, fire, bullets,
barbed wire, shallow graves.
What happed to Raphael
from El Salvador, or Lucas
from Bosnia, or Arthur
from South Africa? Where
are they? How does it end?
In sixteen years I’ve become
a father twice and seen my father
laid out before the lid was sealed,
before he was lowered down.
Work and children and chores—
you loved me, then drifted.
Cry and talk and try—
persistence brought us back.
You have watched my face,
under worry’s thumb,
keep more creases, become
a bit more bone. Once
only a stranger, pain lingers
in my knees and shoulders.
And you, stranger now living
in those rooms on Summit Street,
would you take a minute to look
across the street? Can you
see them, little dots, catching
a bit of sun as they fly
in and out, banking sweetness
against whatever comes?