Rooftop Apiary at Dusk

On the hospital roof, the hives breathe warm cedar, between satellite dishes and a rusted weather vane. Evening lifts its brass lid from the avenues, and traffic begins to sound like a distant sea.

Bees return heavy with clover from vacant lots, with linden dust from streets nobody names. Their legs carry small gold verdicts against the concrete's long gray argument.

A nurse on break leans by the parapet, watching them stitch the air with patient thread. Below, ambulances open and close like mouths; above, wings keep writing yes on the wind.

When night arrives, the city keeps all its sirens, but the comb grows brighter in the dark boxes. Honey thickens out of siren, pollen, rain, a slow sun stored where we can reach it.