The wasps that had landed on his mailbox’s metal hold had ‘insubstantial’ nest of ‘mud and paper’. Neither the ‘threats and warnings’ nor the ‘U.S. Mail’ that lands on them each day, will help make them disappear. The wasps are ignoring all the stack of mails that have arrived. They are described to be too concentrated on their own work and obligations which make them blind to the dangers of the outside world.
“And I think they know my strength, can gauge the danger of their work.” He thinks that the wasps knew what sort of consequences they could be once a human like him attacked them. They knew there were huge gigantic creatures around them. The word ‘blow’ is quite a strong word to use. This relates to other words in the poem such as ‘savagely’, ‘aerial’ and ‘threats and warnings.’ These are terms used in war conditions. It might mean that the wasps are bombarding the place. This adds tension and hostility to the atmosphere of the poem, leaving the reader with a sense of resentment and violence. The line that states “I am not their friend” indicates a gap between the wasps and the person, disliking each other, just like being one’s enemy. Readers can already tell his strong temptations to destroy the wasps after reading the phrase “One blow could crush them.”
“Too deeply and too fiercely occupied” strongly shows that the wasps take absolutely no notice of any presence in their physical surroundings that might concern them. “To bother to attend” most probably indicates that the wasps have no interest in paying any awareness to their enemy. Before we read that phrase, we probably thought that he was going to destroy the nest as they were invading part of his property.
When looking at this poetry of invading the wasps, readers could find the poet’s views on humanities. In the line of “I think I know what it is like to live in an alien and gigantic universe” is referred an imagination of the life of the wasps. The wasps, being small creatures, are surrounded by strangers on this vast planet. Also it could be referring to us humans, being so self-centred and captivated by our own world that we, as well as the wasps, cannot see the dangers of outside our door.
Throughout this poem, there are words like ‘a-hum’ and ‘humming’ and the term ‘resonantly’ all describe how wasps sound like when “invading”. The sounds add genuineness to the poem as one can almost hear the wasps’ buzzing. The humming in this poem seems to be in a beastly way, which suggests the noise of the wasps is brutal and abhorrent.
The expression “fragile citadels” are two words of opposite meaning. This contradicting image tells the reader that although, on the outside, something might look robust and positive; it might internally be delicate and weak. This vague image is used to express both the wasps’ nest and also humans. And then the last line was “at the edge of danger”. This probably refers to the safety of the wasps. Their nest on the mailbox is built in an atmosphere of insecurity.
The tone of the poem appears to be solemn and melancholy. Even though some of the phrases could mean war conditions, the poem never becomes quite as angry and heated as one would expect. It could probably be because he understands the difficult situation the wasps are in, even though they occupied his property. This is linked to the line “I know what it is like to live in an alien and gigantic universe.” This poem did not had a lot of rhyming words, however, there were still several of them such as ‘gold - hold’, ‘a-hum – come’ which slightly cheers up the mood.
