The carpenter bees leave their sawdust dunes
heaped on the porch beneath the wood railing
like ancient pyramids returning to sand,
and the damn termites have taken the walls.

Last night I dreamt I was the dead pharaoh,
the tyrant king mummified in his tomb.
A carved history fading from stone tablets
as looters filled satchels with gold. The worms
had already come and gone, picked the skull
clean. My chest was a winter honeycomb,
a bee's papery nest seized by hoarfrost.

While thieves sifted my organ jars for jewels,
I grinned jawbone through the din gauze. I felt
the hive stir, all the bloodless wings thrumming.