Apiary Under the Overpass

At dawn, beneath the highway’s iron river, bees lift from painted boxes like sparks from wet cedar. Truck tires drum above them, a slow black thunder, and clover in the median opens its small green hands.

The air tastes of diesel, fennel, and warm rain. Workers comb the light from bottlebrush and vine, returning with pollen dusted gold on their knees, as if they had knelt in some roadside chapel of weeds.

A mechanic across the fence pauses his wrench, watching their bright arithmetic through exhaust haze. He says the city is always hungry, always loud, but this hum is a softer engine, patient and exact.

By evening, the overpass holds a violet shadow. Honey gathers in the dark, cell by shining cell, while above, the traffic keeps naming its urgency, and below, something ancient continues without witness.