Bee vs Wasp
I.
End the long summer
Saw a thousand stings,
The irked bee calls
An assembly of things
Which hover in flowerbeds
And circle in flight,
Banded gold and black ringed
And don’t sting out of spite.
An envoy wasp forthwith summoned
Arrived by eve, struck was drummond,
Proceedings began in earnest for an end
Bees of wood and wasp would be friends;
Wasp upon dais orating his claim
That a wasp has the freedom to choose who he maims,
Why else, he argued, do we keep our sting
When using yours once does heavenward bring?
A buzzing, breezing, bopping thing,
The wasp flew to the side of the king
And there did whisper with brandished spear
Honeying that pollen-drunk ear.
II.
A spring Lord now in autumn tires
Will steely face when vernal expires;
His Queen will seek another mate
Broodsack hatch another’s satiate;
But before he goes a dream to indulge
Under his charge peace, no gae bolg.
Ere he died pray a ringing bugle,
Harking all to a peace he’d fugle.
In the longhall of the apiary
Wasp kingdom’s plenipotentiary
Did his best to make peace
It seemed - he was liar to the teeth!
Sent was he to stir up war
Which in terms of stings they could not endure,
Ridding for good the Arcadian lay
Of the seed-drunk sky cows and the poet’s bee-loud day.
Knowing they of treachery hatched
A cunning plan, smithees hatched
A suit of armour for to don the king,
A wattled suit of honey rings
And plated comb a sting to sunder,
And a wasp’s sting lost long, bee’s sole blunder;
All who saw it swipe like thunder
Rose as one and humming wonder
Now, the apiary drapery
Was privvy to their treachery;
Had soaked in glue thus imbued
Flapping flags with strength renewed,
And when the wasp did stingless reel
Spurting blood from the stump-was-steel
Careening backward entwine, stuck fast
A handcuff chain for the stripey arse.
There he sits now and to this day
All who pass beg to pay
Respect and deference, a good luck charm -
A wasp envoy who meant them harm.
