Hi there.
I hope you’re having a good Monday. This morning I have a poem to share inspired by the fall scenery of Mount Pisgah Arboretum I was walking through during yesterday’s Mushroom Festival. The below-freezing temps we’ve been getting at nights in Eugene mean both the harvest and mushroom seasons are coming to a close, just in time for everyone’s favorite holiday about death and candy. I’m shifting into prep mode for moving but still dreaming about writing projects, foraging tours, and greeting cards. It seems like a lot to juggle, but I know I can handle it, if I take a cue from the forest and conceive of my personal and professional growth in phases.
Time is moving. This intro is over, and the poem begins below.
Turkey tails striated like Saturn’s rings
Emerge from logs rotted by last year’s storms.
Yellowed maple leaves one by one falling,
The same energy assuming new forms.
Polypores concealing underside mazes,
Licking up the leaning corpse of an oak,
Attest all life comes and goes in phases
And for fungi, death is just a good joke.