POEM

Daddy: 1933

by Geoffrey Brock

If one takes   
a walk on a clear sunny   
day in middle April,

when the first   
willows are in bloom,   
one may often see   

young bumblebee queens   
eagerly sipping
nectar from the catkins

thus begins
the one book written
by Otto Emil Plath.

It is a delightful thing
to pause and watch
these queens, clad

in their costumes of rich   
velvet, their wings
not yet torn

he wrote it the year after   
Sylvia was born—
by the long foraging

flights which   
they will be obliged   
to take later.

This poem originally appeared in the June 2008 issue of Poetry.

June 2008 issue of Poetry Magazine

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 Geoffrey  Brock

Born in Atlanta, Geoffrey Brock received an MFA from the University of Florida and a PhD from the . . . MORE »

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