Wasps

Scott Provence

Late in autumn
they come inside.
They have heard us fighting,
and smelled the small venoms
we carried from room to room.
At first, we were afraid
because we had been hurt before.
But as one walks across the table,
over the crags of my knuckle,
he forgets his rage, that small,
segmented emotion.

First snow: we notice the delicate
bodies. We see the frosted husk
of an empty hive.
Our wind-up toy travelers
drift through the chilling air,
chest-level like half-filled balloons.
They fall asleep in the carpet
and in November we build fires,
abandoning our nests of anger, giving up
the pinch that separates
head from heart.