Last night I called you.
But you didn’t answer.
I was running late.
But that wasn’t new.
So, I texted,
“I am here.”
I waited for you, but you weren’t there. So, I went to sleep expecting to hear. But when I woke up, you still weren’t there. A blank empty screen void the usual sarcastic reply.
I waited some more till the sky was fully bright. My finger primed and ready to type,
“Are you there?”
Before my flesh could touch the glowing A, a text from another arrived on my blank display. The letters filling the unknowing black void.
And in that moment I knew I was being notified.
Later I remembered the week before, when I was running late racing to call.
But that wasn’t new.
And you texted,
“I won’t be there.”
A bit of relief for my usual lateness. We will always have our next week.
I thought about texting,
“Are you ok?”
But life got in the way of seeing if you were still here. I don’t know what good it would’ve done. Cause you already had left being human.
A few days before my notification, I felt a dread of unknown proportions. I texted a friend that wasn’t you and just decided to ignore, push through.
Were you there reading my text of dread?
Words of unknown knowing?
Were you saying to me I am here?
Was I too busy ignoring?
You always wished you could hear spirit play. Listening for knocks and wanting guidance to show you the way.
I am sorry I was not listening. I did not hear the knocks to know you were here.
Were you there?
Was I too busy to care?
Later that day I caught a bee out the corner of my eye.
A dreaded wasp, but bee is prettier to say.
A bee on my window in the dead of winter?
This is not something usually seen. I walked closer to see this oddity display. This must be a queen, a queen who wants to stay.
What has confused you queen to awaken when it is so cold?
I watched her covered in dust and webby strings attempting to find her place in the light of the window pane throne. Lethargic and broken, reaching and falling, one leg continually grasping in a survival plight.
I gently picked up my queen with a stiff paper stretcher for fear of possible bare handed stingings.
Foolish, I know.
I am afraid of a queen without much life left to being.
That is the funny thing of stingings. They are for a moment while feared for a lifetime of knotted strings.
I opened the window and placed the queen on a red brick ledge.
Be free my queen, be free.
I watched the light pierce her body as the little leg now grasped the red brick ledge of life.
I watched and watched and watched some more. Then wondered if I’d made a mistake. Oh my little queen bee, I know you were dying when we met. I may have confused you with my desire to be free.
Tell me,
Did I cause more suffering and fret?
Yes, we could feel the universe blow its windy breath.
But did I cause more suffering and fret?
Yes, we landed in the unknown vastness of being in flow.
But tell me queen,
Did I cause more suffering and fret?
“Was I wrong to free you from the confined glass windows?
Yes, the bee was already dying, this I know.
Please, I beg you to tell me the secrets of the unknown. It is this constant dying to let go that tears my heart. But, you knew this of me. You were one of the few that understood this tearing apart.
Were you there, watching, dying with me and the bee?
I no longer could watch my suffering and fret. So, I grappled for my stiff paper stretcher.
Dear queen bee, I should’ve held you those last gasping breaths and let the sting pierce into me. Please forgive me!
Did you need to be free or just held in your dying pleas?
Still afraid of opening to stinging fears and dead winter days I watched my queen drop away. My stiff paper stretcher accidentally pushing her off the red brick ledge of being.
Were you there watching my heart tear apart once again with your new eyes to see?
My queen reminds me of a younger time with grasping stinging bees.
I remember the time I would hear grasping scrapes above my head in the dead of the night. I investigated and seeked and seeked and investigated for a rational answer.
They surely would tell me I’m dreaming.
I was much younger then with sweet honey dreams and feared to share of nightly scrapings. They surely would say it was all made up in a silly girl’s head trappings.
So, I learned to sleep with nightly scrapings and ignore fearful head screams.
How could I not be dreaming?
Then one day something didn’t look right. I climbed closer to see what I’d ignored in fear. Armed with curiosity, I was ready to fight.
Look at that, a thin white bubble had appeared.
“Surely, you must be dreaming,” they’d say.
As I gently pressed into the white bubble, bees began to flow one by one from the white walled sky.
Dreaded wasps to be exact, but bees are prettier to say.
I ran downstairs no longer afraid to tell of grasping scrapes in the dead of the night. I now feared the bees more than thoughts of being told it was all in my dreams.
“There are bees flowing from the ceiling!”
They must believe me!
“No,” they said,
“You must be dreaming.”
I pleaded again and again about bees fleeing.
Then with a sigh and a shaming eye, they climbed the stairs to prove I must be dreaming. To their surprise, I was not scheming as bees in fact were flowing from the ceiling.
One by one bees filling my tiny bedroom where I once had been sleeping.
This was long before I knew you or attempted to free queen bees.
Why do we remember funny little stories in moments like these?
Lethargic and broken, reaching and falling, one leg continually grasping in a survival plight. A clamoring for light while clinging to a red brick ledge of life in the dead of winter.
Did you remember my bees?
Were you trying to tell me I am here before I knew you were there?
I look at my last text to you.
“I am here.”
Was that me to you or you to me?
I clamor for signs to know you are here, make sense of this uncomfortable unknowing.
I am the wasp and so were you.
We were clinging to a ledge of living while dying in the dead winter light together.
Until the wind blew you free.
I am waiting for your signs.
I am waiting for your signs.
Please, I beg of you, send me some damn fucking signs.
I need to know you are here.
I don’t want to be dying alone on a red brick ledge waiting to be blown.
