Fifties Music   

by Leslie Monsour

 Leslie Monsour reads 

Fifties Music



in RealAudio format.
     

   
  
While women sip their daiquiris by the pool,
and men blow smoke into the jacarandas,
the radio plays "Fly Me to the Moon."

A child nearby, on finding a dead bee,
conducts its funeral in petunia beds,
as ants are trying to amputate a wing.

But even though the bee seems dead, it stings
her fiercely on the palm, and dies again.
She studies her small hand in disbelief.

Some fathers offer ice cubes from their highballs,
the station plays "Volare," and the bee
swings up to heaven on its single wing.

      Able Muse

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