Apiary in the Observatory

At the hill's rusted dome, dawn loosens its bolts. Bees pour from the slit where a telescope once watched Mars. Their bodies carry small suns of pollen. The air hums like a tuning fork in wet grass.

Inside, cracked star maps curl from the walls, constellations fading to tea-colored islands. Honey gathers in the brass throat of the old lens, amber weather storing June in a glass dark.

Children climb the steps with jars and questions, asking if planets taste this warm. A keeper lifts a frame, and light drips slowly, thick as memory, bright as struck copper.

By evening the dome closes one tired eye. The hive settles into its velvet machinery. Above it, first stars pin their cold notes. Below, the comb keeps singing of flowers and iron.