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    A Time of Bees
    A Time of Bees
    A Time of Bees
    Ebook89 pages58 minutes

    A Time of Bees

    By Mona Van Duyn

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    About this ebook

    The twenty-five poems included in this collection present a poet mature in both craft and perception and possessed of a fine capacity for being both lyric and analytic at the same time. There is no posturing, but always a position, both thought and felt.

    Originally published in 1964.

    A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe University of North Carolina Press
    Release dateJun 15, 2018
    ISBN9780807837061
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      Book preview

      A Time of Bees - Mona Van Duyn

      I. VALENTINES TO THE WIDE WORLD

      THREE VALENTINES TO THE WIDE WORLD

      I

      THE CHILD disturbs our view. Tow-head bent, she

      stands on one leg and folds up the other. She is listening

      to the sound of her fingernail on a scab on her knee.

      If I were her mother I would think right now of the chastening

      that ridiculous arrangement of bones and bumps must go through,

      and that big ear too, till they learn what to do and hear.

      People don’t perch like something seen in a zoo

      or in tropical sections of Florida. They’ll have to buy her

      a cheap violin if she wants to make scraping noises.

      She is eight years old. What in the world could she wear

      that would cover her hinges and disproportions? Her face is

      pointed and blank, the brows as light as the hair.

      Mother, is love God’s hobby? At eight you don’t even

      look up from your scab when you ask it. A kid’s squeak,

      is that a fit instrument for such a question?

      Eight times the seasons turned and cold snow tricked

      the earth to death, and still she hasn’t noticed.

      Her friend has a mean Dad, a milkman always kicks

      at the dog, but by some childish hocus-pocus

      she blinks them away. She counts ten and sucks in her cheeks

      and the globe moves under the green thumb of an Amateur,

      the morning yelp, the crying at recess are gone.

      In the freeness of time He gardens, and to His leisure

      old stems entrust new leaves all winter long.

      Hating is hard work, and the uncaring thought is hard,

      but loving is easy, love is that lovely play

      that makes us and keeps us? No one answers you. Such absurd

      charity of the imagination has shamed us, Emily.

      I remember now. Legs shoved you up, you couldn’t tell

      where the next tooth would fall out or grow in, or what

      your own nose would look like next year. Anything was possible.

      Then it slowed down, and you had to keep what you got.

      When this child’s body stretches to the grace of her notion,

      and she’s tamed and curled, may she be free enough to bring

      mind and heart to that serious recreation

      where anything is still possible—or almost anything.

      II

      I have never enjoyed those roadside overlooks from which

      you can see the mountains of two states. The view keeps generating

      a kind of pure, meaningless exaltation

      that I can’t find a use for. It drifts away from things.

      And it seems to me also that the truckdriver’s waste of the world

      is sobering. When he rolls round it on a callous of macadam,

      think how all those limping puppydogs, girls

      thumbing rides under the hot sun, or under the white moon

      how all those couples kissing at the side of the road,

      bad hills, cat eyes, and horses asleep on their feet

      must run together into a statement so abstract

      that it’s tiresome. Nothing in particular holds still in it.

      Perhaps he does learn that the planet can still support life,

      though with some difficulty. Or even that there is injustice,

      since he rolls round and round and may be able to feel

      the slight but measurable wobble of the earth on its axis.

      But what I find most useful is the poem. To find some spot

      on the surface and then bear down until the skin can’t stand

      the tension and breaks under it, breaks under that half-demented

      pressure of speech the psychiatrists saw in Pound

      is a discreetness of consumption that I value. Only the poem

      is strong enough to make the initial rupture,

      at least for me. Its view is simultaneous

      discovery and reminiscence. It starts with the creature

      and stays there, assuming creation is worth the time

      it takes, from the first day down to the last line on the last page.

      And I’ve never seen anything like it for making you think

      that to spend your life on such old premises is a privilege.

      III

      Your yen two wol slee me sodenly;

      I may the beautee of hem not sustene.

      Merciles Beaute

      When, in the middle of my life, the earth stalks me

      with sticks and stones, I fear its merciless beauty.

      This morning a bird woke me with a four-note outcry,

      and cried out eighteen times. With the shades down, sleepy

      as I was, I recognized his agony.

      It resembles ours. With one more heave, the day

      sends us a generous orb and lets us see

      all sights lost when we lie down finally.

      And if, in the

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