University of Minnesota Press, $24.95
Our beloved honey makers and pollinators are in danger of disappearing. And in the world of poetry, a lyrical hum has been buzzing for many years. Poets from Shakespeare, Emerson and Coleridge, to Yeats, Plath and Lawrence, have been writing about bees. Even Emily Dickinson has chimed in, providing inspiration to this book’s title: To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, / One clover, and a bee, / And revery. / The revery alone will do / If bees are few. Her conclusion; bees are indeed becoming few—hives are collapsing and wild species are disappearing. To help save the bees, a portion of the proceeds from this anthology will be donated to support research at the University of Minnesota Bee Lab.—Breana Roy