The female honeybee lives sixty-seven days

Until her battered mica wings fail and

She drops dead at her workplace

 

Even after my father retired from hydraulic oil

He continued to work there, aged sixty-seven, amber-colored,

And died as he was climbing stairs, his tools noisy

 

They move the bodies carefully, there is a procedure.

The colony is energetic as ever, humming with industry

And will only crawl around them for so long.