A Hymn to Persephone of the Fungi that Turned Into Something Else
Revered princess, It is you I sing thanks to for the mushrooms
Death is never easy And I have seen many turn their eyes from the unpleasant: From emotions, sticky rage and despair From the smell of decay and the white eyes of dead things And from the living things I adore above all - the fungi that creep above and under the earth
Nothing else reminds me of you more, Queen
From your mother did you learn the noble art of nourishing, growing, and harvesting But these are different beasts from the wheat indeed, Goddess And that is why when I see these pale-capped things pushing up from dead leaves I think of your fingers Tender at times, chaotic at others Sending out mycelium, little (yet sweeping) networks of death, decay and renewal Even as you join your Mother above the Earth.
Oh yes - forgive me, for I know they are not always lovely looking But when I glimpse the local fungi I always think of you, Goddess.
Like spring, they can be tender - Sought after and cradled like morels Which herald the sweet rain of spring Or truffles shaved over pasta, coveted
Like life they can be marvellous - red crowned castles to be plucked from the earth for hungry adventurous mouths
And they can be treacherous, Creeping fungus sickness, spreading mycelium Hollowing trunks and ribcages alike Returning us to the earth
Perhaps the hubris has taken me; But the mushrooms infest my family tree My grandfather, Ivan, identified mushrooms for his small community And as far as I know he had no formal training
Did he learn to listen to the slow creeping and growing In order to sink his incisors into fleshy caps and stems? Did he avoid their tricky gills or did he fall prey to the lookalike mimics? Did the spores he peered at in the dim porch light Infect my genetics enough that I was born with the cocked eye of a magpie Forever seeking those same small heads that burst above soil?
There are so many questions I have about my family But I was born too late And they are all soil memories now
Are they down there with you, vengeful Queen? Do they ever speak? I must admit I cannot parse that world very well:
I have never had the ear for hidden things. So when I sing your praises, Goddess I suppose a part of me wishes for The gift of listening: To press my cheek against the ground To listen for creeping mushrooms and ancestors alike
Above all, Praise be to Kore, mistress of mushrooms
