Welcome to “Poetry at The Arts Fuse.” A new poem every Thursday.

A Blue of Bees

I

You remove her face
And another face appears
And smells like oranges

You remove this face
And another appears,
And tastes like milk

When you stood up
It became clear
That bees
Are not made
Of wood
But of earth

II

You are not
The doll’s
Painted
Face

You are not
A Face
Inside of
Another’s face

You are a beehive
Dripping in
Honey and wax
And you maybe a
Queen

III

Once there was a girl
Trapped inside
An iron maiden
With only a bee
As a confidant

A bee who is a secret keeper
And a bee of noble heart
A bee of kindly touch
But without a key

They dwelled until
They dwelt no more
And left upon this earth
Mortal coils inside a corset
Of steel and honey

In the mid-90s, Brenda Coultas moved to New York City to work on the staff of the Poetry Project. Her poetry can be found in the forthcoming anthology Other Influences: Essays on Feminist Avant-garde Poetic Lineages. Her latest collection, The Writing of an Hour, an ars poetica, was published by Wesleyan University Press in 2022.

Note: Hey poets! We seek submissions of excellent poetry from across the length and breadth of contemporary poetics. See submission guidelines here. The arbiter of the feature is the magazine’s poetry editor, John Mulrooney.

— Arts Fuse editor Bill Marx