Last week I was horrified to read this article about neonicotinoid clothianidin pesticides killing honeybees. Honeybees have been on the decline for several years. I am hearing it from beekeepers. I am noticing it in my own yard, where my catmint plants used to be abuzz with the little pollinators, and now there are just a few. The new statistics are alarming. I urge you to read the article. As we know, honeybees are essential to the vegetation on earth.

Photo courtesy of wikimedia commons

For today’s Poetry Friday, I am offering a bee poem by Rudyard Kipling:

The Bee-Boy’s Song

Bees! Bees! Hark to your bees!
“Hide from your neigbours as much as you please,
But all that has happened, to us you must tell,
Or else we will give you no honey to sell!” 

A maiden in her glory,
Upon her wedding – day,
Must tell her Bees the story,
Or else they’ll fly away.
Fly away — die away –
Dwindle down and leave you!
But if you don’t deceive your Bees,
Your Bees will not deceive you.

Marriage, birth or buryin’,
News across the seas,
All you’re sad or merry in,
You must tell the Bees.
Tell ‘em coming in an’ out,
Where the Fanners fan,
‘Cause the Bees are just about
As curious as a man!

Don’t you wait where the trees are,
When the lightnings play,
Nor don’t you hate where Bees are,
Or else they’ll pine away.
Pine away — dwine away –
Anything to leave you!
But if you never grieve your Bees,
Your Bees’ll never grieve you.

Now please buzz over to Tabatha Yeatts’s site for the complete Poetry Friday Round-up!