The End of My Life The bees nearly took me with them. They came from nowhere like water trickling from a rusted faucet, too cold, or from a pump, like the one attached to the wooden floor in the back room of my grandmother’s house. I would imagine how far down the well was dug beneath the graying floorboards; I would step away into the kitchen, safe. Clouds and men were gathering, circling, and keeping me from my children. They could not see what I saw, the white wind swirling near the stairs, the wind I saw just as surely as I saw the rain barrel behind my grandmother’s house where I drank cold black water from a rusted cup, dipped under the disturbed surface, tasted metallic, and wondered if everything would be okay.
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Anne Gr aue
SIXFOLD POETRY SUMMER 2013