Too Much Perfection Is a Mistake

Matt Bell

First published in Salt Hill 33 (2014).

When the gunslinger dies
his body becomes the beehive.
After the blood is gone.
After the perfect bullet
circumvents the flesh,
penetrates the dirt or the wood
or the stone. After the soul,
if the dead man believed
in his soul. Each beehive
a lone swarm massing
in the desert. It's men
who kill but it's the gods
who dictate the bees.
Our leftover buzzing,
our honey sweetened
with thickening sorrow.
All our sticky knowledge.
All our ambitions and insights
and deadly, deathly skill.
All useless if what we want
is to last. The gods come
as scavengers, enormous
as ancient lions. Who learn from
nothing but what they devour.

Matt Bell is the author most recently of the novel Appleseed (a New York Times Notable Book) published by Custom House in July 2021. His craft book Refuse to Be Done, a guide to novel writing, rewriting, and revision, will follow in early 2022 from Soho Press. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Esquire, Tin House, Fairy Tale Review, American Short Fiction, Orion, and many other publications. A native of Michigan, he teaches creative writing at Arizona State University.