Rooftop Apiary Before Rush Hour

Before the buses clear their throats, a ladder leans into the pale wind. On the tar-black roof, wooden hives hum like small harmoniums warming up.

Smoke curls from the keeper's tin, lavender and pine in a single breath. Thousands of amber bodies lift and settle, writing quick ellipses over satellite dishes.

Below, crosswalks blink their patient code, coffee steam climbs from paper mouths. Above, each comb is a cathedral of hexagons, sunlight poured and stored as taste.

By noon the skyline hardens to glass, but morning remains in the jars on her shelf: gold that remembers rain gutters, clover cracks, and the soft percussion of wings on air.