Leslie Shinn
In the Throne Room Kitchen


Live dice, the two bees
tumbling in the white window

under the watery green
ceiling, way over the table

where the giant sits in the one chair.
He's wrapped his poor feet in doused wool

same as his toothache rag, his red brick jaw
swathed in liniment up to a rabbity topknot.

Down the long, dark kitchen
those bees are the big noise

now that his head has quieted
and the supper creatures have cooked—

furled black flowers at the ends of arms,
the tails curled close.

With bread and meat measured,
the done day too is counted and marked,

its throw of cloud beheld, its lot of sun.
The chances of its share and want,

enough.  The bees cease, and
the night folds in from all sides.

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