Following a recent dinner, the Poet Laureat Dame Carol Ann Duffy, DBE, FRSL has penned a poem which she has graciously granted us permission to publish.
Virgil’s Bees
Bless air’s gift of sweetness, honey
from the bees, inspired by clover,
marigold, eucalyptus, thyme,
the hundred perfumes of the wind.
Bless the beekeeper
who chooses for her hives
a site near water, violet beds, no yew,
no echo. Let the light lilt, leak, green
or gold, pigment for queens,
and joy be inexplicable but there
in harmony of willowherb and stream,
of summer heat and breeze,
each bee’s body
at its brilliant flower, lover-stunned,
strumming on fragrance, smitten.
For this,
let gardens grow, where beelines end,
sighing in roses, saffron blooms, buddleia;
where bees pray on there knees, sing, praise
in pear trees, plum trees; bees
are the batteries of orchards, gardens, guard them.