MAGPIE/ Prompt #65

                                                    photo/ Tess Kincaid/ Magpie Tales

WHAT A POWERFUL IMAGE for this week's Magpie Tales.  A favorite saint, lead me on....


ST. MANDOLIRA *

I will be a saint one day too,
threading a needle of hope
and genuflected to.

Martyrs haven't owned this title yet,
the Patron Saint of Worker Bees
and Violins.

For the amber flow
of honey
in a hexagon geometry,
pray to me.

If you play a Stradivari,
do the same.

Saints give up their skeletons,
I pluck a string
with a sliver of mine.

My world is a reliquary,
I have holy bones too,
and bless the honeyed tea.


*Mandolira...a musical instrument.

copyright/ all rights reserved/ 2011


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RED BEES...

A young lady has been raising bees in Red Hook, Brooklyn.  Keep that word, Red, in mind. 

Since May, her bees have been returning to their hives looking quite different, with odd stripes of color where a mellow touch of amber usually showed through the membrane of their stomachs.  What always was a honey color, suddenly became a brazen red.  The honeycombs were also strangely red. 

It was thought at first that the bees were hanging around some sumac, or an odd tree or two.  But then a friend suggested (being funny) that maybe the bees were lounging around Dell's Maraschino Cherries Company over on Dikeman Street, in Red Hook, Brooklyn.

It seemed impossible to believe that the bees would travel a good distance, bypassing mother nature, to fill up on junk food.  Hmm, sounds a bit familiar.  We humans seem to favor overlooking the natural for artificial anything!
But bees, too?  What's the buzz here?

An apiculturist found, through samples taken from the bees, that Red Dye # 40, was the same dye used in the maraschino cherries.  And some folks came forth with the news that lots and lots of bees were hanging around Dell's.

It seems that bees will dip into any sweet liquid in their flight path.  It's thought that the bees were slurping up the runoff at the factory.  The question became if the bees would abandon the bright red, abundant sweetness, for some natural nectar.  Perhaps putting a screen around the cherry factory might help to prevent the foragers from hanging around, which is proving to be a huge nuisance! 

It remains to be seen if the best real nectar can be a match for this hot tamale red, excessively sweet, artificially enhanced treat.  Because the yield from this last summer did indeed produce a honey, bright red, that was sort of metallic, and too sweet.  The upside is, that in the evening, the bees glowed a lovely crimson.


Original source: New York Times, 11/30/10


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Magpie/ Prompt #7

photo/willow/magpie tales

THE BODY IN THE SUNROOM

She said her name was Marple.  Miss Jane Marple.  She knocked on the door shortly after that piercing scream rang through the mansion.  Fontescue let her in, a seemingly harmless little old lady.  He took the card from her gloved hand and showed her into the library.  And summoned me, Lady Daphne.

We had all gone to tea in the sunroom, celebrating the arrival of Prince Victor of Romania, and the reading of the will, when suddenly there was a noise at the window.  A blackbird crashed into a pane, Livie dropped a scone, and Percy tripped over poor Lady Agatha's body, which must have been lying behind the sofa since before any of us had arrived.  I was the one who screamed, as who wouldn't at the sight of a beloved sister-in-law, lying wide eyed and dead at our feet.

"Oh, Miss Marple", I exclaimed, having been fetched to meet her in the library.  "What brings you here?"

She exclaimed, " I heard a scream as I was crossing the footbridge, and just knew that a body couldn't be too far away.  But, not in the library, I see."

"No", said I, "Not this time. In the sunroom."  She looked knowingly around the room, a tiny smile lifting the corner of her lightly rouged lips. 

"Did the the blackbird die?"

"Yes", I exclaimed, amazed at her prescience.  I clutched my throat.  "It's lying in a bed of daffodils".

"Can you show me, please", she asked.  I walked quickly with Miss Marple at my side, to the sunroom, Fortescue rushing ahead to open the door for us. 

Since all were still assembled around poor Lady Agatha, Miss Marple had no need to gather everyone, as she solved the mystery. 

Pointing to the garden, and the very dead, very black, blackbird, she bent over the spilled teacup, and the delicate yellow daffodil petals lying at poor Lady Agatha's feet.  "I presume that poor Lady Agatha was to be the recipient of the entire content of the will, that you ", she pointed at Sir Clive, "were about to read.  If you please, do begin.  We'll probably see who the next in line for the fortune will be in the event of poor Lady Agatha's unfortunate demise.  Ah, such lovely daffodils all around...and who here has recently prepared a daffodil honey"?

Everyone looked around and the gazes fell on one person.  "Who here is so familiar with the ever present daffodil, and its most unique property"?  Miss Marple scanned the room as she spoke.  "Who left the jar of honey unguarded, knowing that poor Lady Agatha had a tendancy to arrive before anyone else for tea, so she could have a surreptitious spoonful of honey?  Unknowing at the time, of course, that a dose of the daffodil's dark side was being administered.  I refer of course to the poisonous Lycorine, in the leaves, in the bulb.  Really unexpected in the beauty of the flower of Springtime, but ever present nevertheless.  As poor Lady Agatha was doomed to find out". 

Miss Marple made a strange gesture, scratching the back of her hands.  "And the murderer is giving a bit more away...having daffodil itch!  Hyperkeratosis, as we know, is an almost unbearable dryness and scaling that comes from the calcium oxalate in the sap.  And someone here does not seem able to resist an impulsive scratch. 

"The poison in the honey"?  Miss Marple slowly turned, and exclaimed, "If you look in Lady Daphne's sagging pocket, you will find the jar of honey, next to the red herring, laced with poison.  The killer obviously is..."

...and she pointed to me, as I scratched my hands...



Great thanks to Willow at magpie/prompts#7 for giving us all this fun opportunity!


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