Goodbye BLB

We found BLB ("Big Little Bee"), our second disabled bee, crawling on the lawn on 28th May. He breathed his last in our care on 7th June, just 11 days later. He was probably somewhere between and 11 and 14 days old. A very short innings.

Though we wonder about the care we provided, the reality is, there is nothing more we could do than provide, warmth, safety, honey, water and some fresh flowers and we surely extended his life beyond that of limping round the lawn as imminent prey. 

He seemed to expire over the course of about 18 hours - the first obvious sign being fairly motionless, flat on his back. Although he eventually righted himself, wandered around his box, and eventually spent the night under his pine cone, this was a sign of sad things to come.

It was a surprisingly sad moment when BCW let me know the news today - perhaps because we had been able to give the gift of extended life to such a small fragile life form; perhaps because of the joy and laughter he caused us through his mad bumblings and inexplicable behaviour. Perhaps just because he Was.

Anyway, I was moved to poetry:

Goodbye our dear "Big Little Bee", 

gone so soon and so sadly.

 

In youth, so bright,  so energetic,

in truth, so bumbly, so chaotic.

 

You loved to dance and dive and preen,

though destined not to find your queen.

 

A pine cone was your choice for rest,

beside a sumptious five-star nest.

 

You overcame one-sided odds,

lame and bent before the Gods.

 

Big little Bee you brought such joy

to the weary days of this small boy.

 

Alas, you never could fulfil your role,

but BLB, you filled this soul.

A Poem

A life so buzzy,

A life so free.

This is the life

of a fuzzy little bee.