The Murmur of Bees

by Sofía Segovia

At her age, she reckoned, with the things her eyes had seen, her ears had heard, her mouth spoken, her skin felt, and her heart suffered, she had been through enough to make anyone weary. She couldn’t explain why she was still alive or what she was waiting for before she departed, since she was no longer of any use to anybody and her body had dried up, so she preferred not to see or be seen, not to hear, not to speak, and not to feel.

Is this despair?

I may be old, but I don’t talk to myself or see things that aren’t there. Not yet. I know a

“Ah, Son, there’s nothing to worry about. For the first three years of your life, I thought you were half-backward, and look at you now.”

Because one night, between one sweet-sounding song and another, she understood that, while life offers no guarantees, sometimes it does offer gifts;