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ISSN: 1941-4137 |
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Volume Four Issue One |
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The Summer I Stopped Catching Bees Old coffee cans smothered every buzz in a stale whiff of morning brew, so I chose canning jars as my weapons, snapping glass around bee and blossom, mastering a sharp click without any cracks. I wanted their haughty hues, their proud hum, so at night I lined my windowsill with jars, each lid squeezed tight with punctured holes The start of school brought Cindy Mills, the first in fifth grade to wear a bra. Once a thin twirl of a girl who danced on the playground in circles, she showed me the year before how to spin without feeling dizzy. I watched her in English class that day, saw her shrink into a shadow. Slouched forward, shoulders hunched, her whole body curved. When the boys pointed to her chest, yelled bee stings, she only sunk lower, her scowl melting parts of the front row. I ran home under the swell of her thick glare, stared at my collection, at the limp bodies banded in bright colors, stranded soft in pyres of dead flowers and grass, before I threw open my screenless window to toss them high into the air, hoping one more time to see a quick shimmy, a lofty shake. |
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