Wasps In The Eaves
- wateryourcellphone
- Oct 7, 2025
- 1 min read
William Doreski
Are those wasps in the eaves? Note
the spring light settling in layers
as early flowers uncrumple
and erupt in flaming puberty.
Despite their display of temper
you refuse to personify them
or anything else, even people.
Like the Colossus of Rhodes
you straddle your waking garden.
Nothing escapes your notice—
not even mice and moles that feed
the bobcat who visits daily.
The wasps may become a nuisance,
but for the moment they cheer us
with their industry and purpose.
We’ve never felt that useful
except when we volunteered
at the cat shelter where friendships
blossomed in many shades of pelt.
We can’t befriend the wasps because
they don’t understand our species
the way cats do. Your flowers—
daffodils, hyacinth, crocus—
re-enact a million bad poems.
They embody the selves we’ve shed
in shades of wind and rain no one
but the bravest painters have caught.
