For Slugman MD

Whether ‘tis nobler to drive your tractor
into a nest full of yellow jackets
and by opposing them not end them.
To sting, to sting—
One more—and by the third or tenth end
the stinging and make way for the natural shocks
and swelling. To swell, to smell of Benadryl—
aye, there’s the rub,
for in that stinking comes the verse of friends
who think: instead of almost shuffling off this mortal coil,
by bearing the whips and scorns of yellowjackets,
you should have paused
turned heel and run like hell,
plunged into your septic tank
or water well
with a bare bodkin! Who would fardels bear,
but that dread of bees, their great buzz
from which nest no traveler returns.
Soft you now,
The swollen Slugman!