Homage to John Ashbery

Several years ago, after reading John Ashbery's "Some Trees," I wrote the following poem, which is a direct imitation. The subject matter is mine, as is the negativity, but the form is more or less Ashbery's, with emphasis on enjambment and near rhymes.

To -------

The bee bumps against the glass again
And again, as though her brain

Takes direction from a satellite
That maps the shades beyond it --

Low light that skims the concrete stubble.
Her frustration becomes terrible,

A rattling like venetian blinds
Set in motion by the wind.

She wants only to rejoin the hive
Out there, somewhere, where you live

With my name a blister on your lips.
I raise the sash, and she escapes,

Off to add her fanning to the colony.
We share the impulse, she

And I, except no window blocks
My will, and I am never coming back.