"I dreamt—marvelous error!—"
hanging out down in the beehive
Jean-Henri Fabre, from Book of Insects, 1921
from Last Night As I Was Sleeping
by Antonio Machado
Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that I had a beehive
here inside my heart.
And the golden bees
were making white combs
and sweet honey
from my old failures.
In the original:
Anoche cuando dormía
soñé ¡bendita ilusión!
que una colmena tenía
dentro de mi corazón;
y las doradas abejas
iban fabricando en él,
con las amarguras viejas,
blanca cera y dulce miel.
Creative Invitation
Imagine that one particular failure in your life tastes sweeter than the others. Imagine that, if you ate it, it would cease to be failure, but simply be dessert.
What shape and flavor would you imagine this failure to be?
Here’s mine:
