Nest

by Juliet Antill

I’m slow to realise about the bees.
Slow, in the slow buzz of afternoon,
to see that their waverings – low to the ground
by the side of the shed – are anything but casual.
Now I see as well as comings there are goings;
these are quick and easy to miss. I imagine
a nest behind the stacks of cut larch.

Two summers ago I was host to wasps.
They built their nest against the shed door
and every time I went in for a fork or a pot
I exposed them. One day I opened the door
and they were gone, fed up with the intrusions,
the sudden rushes of light and air. They left
their grand design in paper and spit.