tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8163916.post111560830423757042..comments2023-12-03T03:43:26.162-05:00Comments on Out of the Woodwork: THE LARGEST SINGLE ORGANISM ON EARTHBrian Campbellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17182888011015400963noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8163916.post-1115757960823117292005-05-10T16:46:00.000-04:002005-05-10T16:46:00.000-04:00Lorna, Ha ha ha!! (Actually, I didn’t laugh: jus...Lorna, <BR/><BR/>Ha ha ha!! (Actually, I didn’t laugh: just a big wide warm smile, as when I watch a Shakespearean comedy, say As You Like It done really well…)<BR/><BR/>You’ve made my day. I really expected no response like this one… <BR/><BR/>As for the poem, I love the title. The writing is rather crabbed and thick and fumbling and dense, but you could say this is rather like the fungus itself. Especially all that sweaty spittled turtled-browedness: I can really feel the mushroom under my feet, smell and taste its musky pungency, yuck! But that’s the quality of this particular fungus: you’ve captured that, I must say. (Quite a lot to capture, 8 million pounds' worth!)<BR/><BR/>While the poem is the right number of lines, follows the sonnet rhyme scheme and is an acrostic as prescribed (amazing feats in themselves, especially in 20 minutes or less) I have to point out that it does not exactly scan Shakespearean. <BR/><BR/>It’s lines range from 4 to 7 meandering crooked-toed feet. <BR/><BR/>However, I think you could reply this is the way a fungus would scan, or the way a fungus would indeed WRITE A SONNET. So bravo! Although it may called an Ode to Armillaria Ostoyae, and appear not to be written from that vast honey mushroom’s point of view, the poem could be actually written from its point of view, which we can presume meanders in and out and around and through and beyond itself. <BR/><BR/>So bravo again.<BR/><BR/>I award you A+. <BR/><BR/>Now you’re free to go out and play (if you haven’t done so already…). <BR/><BR/>Write the poem of your dreams with that glorious title, let it take the form it wants, let its meandering feet spread across this continent and fulfill its Manifest Destiny… (strangle the Whitehouse, if you like… as I would like…)<BR/><BR/>Kindest regards,<BR/><BR/>BrianBrian Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17182888011015400963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8163916.post-1115749115800952142005-05-10T14:18:00.000-04:002005-05-10T14:18:00.000-04:00ODE TO ARMILLARIA OSTOYAE, THE HONEY MUSHROOM, THE...ODE TO ARMILLARIA OSTOYAE, THE HONEY MUSHROOM, THE ELDEST AMERICAN & THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH<BR/><BR/><BR/><BR/>Honey of the beehive that is earth,<BR/>Upon which the heavens circumscribe,<BR/>Mammoth plain of wheat beneath our dirt,<BR/>One of the feathery few, a fertile fecund scribe.<BR/><BR/>New beginnings in your tethered spore,<BR/>Gross acres of weight, tons of semi-shifting spit<BR/>United in a song of musky shore, a sweet load more<BR/>Shimmering up through ages with the mass of it<BR/><BR/>Fidgeting beneath our boring feet, our sappy sweat<BR/>Upon its turtle brow, our sheaves of single cells<BR/>Nourishing; our mineral tears & sloughing grow it, yet.<BR/>Gigantic creature of beaded memories lies & swells,<BR/><BR/>Union of woven flesh & thread is just—<BR/>Singular & pulsing, bonding & releasing—us.<BR/><BR/><BR/>5/10/05 11:07-11:22 am<BR/>c 2005 Lorna Dee CervantesLorna Dee Cervanteshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01239920845079483543noreply@blogger.com