It's Honeybee Awareness Day!

Today is National Honey Bee Day (formerly National Honey Bee Awareness Day) which is set aside to raise awareness re bees; hence my choosing to include the picture directly above of a bee who visits my indoor succulent garden.

According to Wiki and many sources National Honey Bee Day is a day "when beekeepers, beekeeping clubs and associations, and honey bee enthusiasts from all across the United States celebrate honey bees and recognize their contribution to our everyday lives as a means of protecting this critical species. National Honey Bee Day also pays homage to beekeepers, whose labors ensure there are well-managed, healthy bees to pollinate crops."

Bees have been featured in a number of posts within my blog and they are included in volume one of my book series, Words In Our Beak.

THE WORDS IN OUR BEAK BOOK SERIES

Moreover, this insect is featured within my mini movie, Here's The Buzz, which can be viewed within my Vimeo Channel. In honor of this this awareness day, I'll conclude this entry with a series of pics (posted directly below) of bees that I took when I was in Central Park this past Saturday, August the tenth.

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

BEES ARE FEATURED IN VOLUME ONE

Before I sign off on this Honeybee Awareness Day, please let me leave you with a copy of a poem (posted below) by Mary Oliver:

What is this dark hum among the roses?

The bees have gone simple, sipping,

that’s all. What did you expect? Sophistication?

They’re small creatures and they are

filling their bodies with sweetness, how could they not

moan in happiness? The little

worker bee lives, I have read, about three weeks.

Is that long? Long enough, I suppose, to understand

that life is a blessing. I have found them — haven’t you? —

stopped in the very cups of the flowers, their wings

a little tattered — so much flying about, to the hive,

then out into the world, then back, and perhaps dancing,

should the task be to be a scout-sweet, dancing bee.

I think there isn’t anything in this world I don’t

admire. If there is, I don’t know what it is. I

haven’t met it yet. Nor expect to. The bee is small,

and since I wear glasses, so I can see the traffic and

read books, I have to

take them off and bend close to study and

understand what is happening. It’s not hard, it’s in fact

as instructive as anything I have ever studied. Plus, too,

it’s love almost too fierce to endure, the bee

nuzzling like that into the blouse

of the rose. And the fragrance, and the honey, and of course

the sun, the purely pure sun, shining, all the while, over

all of us.