Bee Trap

Each word of mine unconfessed-

How would they sound to you?

Would they touch you in the same way

You've touched me

Without really having touched me?

Or would they sway you 

And encourage you to run

At the same pace my heart does

When I make time to loiter around

In your presence?

These days, my mind is like that jar on the porch

Half full of carcasses and grievances 

"It's only to keep the bad ones out"

But, when you aren't looking,

The good ones share the same demise

I'm afraid for two reasons to let you in

One is the damage you could do

The second, the damage you'll find

The buzzing is enough to drive myself mad

Yet, I find you, and it quiets

Is this somehow a metaphor-

For how releasing dead insects

Becomes a benefaction to myself?

I remind myself: how unfair it is

To plant a garden, and to colonize it

I rescued one from the trap

It was still alive and well

I'd like to think it thanked me

As it paused it's own promise of freedom

To sit comfortably on the jar

I am no longer afraid of being stung

Only of watching something die 

I took the trap down for good

And now, there's no relevance between 

Dead insects and my mind

Those carcasses, laid peacefully to rest 

Like the grievances I once harbored 

Let them not know the fear I once felt

The fear of falling, and climbing endlessly

Amid the stench of similar death

Let me pause to pollinate this garden

To fly away free if the wind tells me so

And carry home the benefits I've reaped 

Things will be different, now

Now that I've taken down the trap

They have to be

Allow the harmony, allow the risk

For without the bees

My garden would never thrive

And today, we share the experience of

What it means to be alive.