Best Fungal Poems
Fae circles of mushrooms
Lanky yellow toadstools
Firm jelly tot larvae
Feed from rich stagnant pools.
Fungal disks cling with wanton
To the grey trunks of trees
Cricket strums join to bird song
Sending messages of peace.
Lambent beams break through foliage
Gradient tones tint the scene
Yellow, purple, and whites
showcased by backgrounds of green.
Fractured rock nests bright flora
Compost mats engage moss
A place of breach and survival.
Nature's gain, (one might say)
is the product of loss.
Written: August 02, 2025, for contest Sponsored by: Crystol Woods
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In the slipshod cradle beneath the apple tree,
a bruised fruit folds ajar—
molten sweet sapidity pooling
through velvet skin.
Eviscerated grace, they say,
but I grasp the quiddity of life unmasked.
A burnt sienna kiss of aurora—
flesh undulating with fungal bloom,
wispy gossamer threads that stitch
the inevitable return to the earth.
It is not ruined.
It is a transformation:
a diaphanous ballet
between death and what dreams may grow.
We ogle brightness,
but rot is brighter still—iridescent with purpose,
alabaster spores pirouetting as sylphlike specters
on a sacred odyssey to placate
the starving soil.
It is seraphic.
It is a panacea.
It is quintessence made humble.
Rapture lies in this ineffable nexus—
decay whispers loud as a lullaby.
The rakish grubs maunder through
a velvet pyre of rind and memory,
and the loquacious beetle sermonizes
on endings as beginnings,
as though time had a gullet
And rot was its sweetest wine.
Call it grotesque.
Call it abhorrent.
But beauty—true, ineffable beauty—
wears many masks.
And in these nebulous throes of perishing,
I watch a face burnished by truth,
smiling with roots in its eyes.
Can there be beauty in my toes,
Where stubbornly a fungus grows?
I never thought it could be true.
I try to hide it with my shoe.
Its purpose, not yet discovered—
I try hard to keep it covered.
From large toe to the next it spread,
And now I look at both with dread.
It wants to grow against the norm,
My toenail with misshapen form,
Knows the wild ways it wants to grow,
And now it has a mate in tow!
I’ve vowed to make a sacred oath
To kill this hated fungal growth,
But I now see the beauty of
My wayward toes denied of love
Are like the people we might hate
And I’ve learned to appreciate
Diversity against the norm,
Well taught to me through my toes’ form;
That each of us must be unique,
And there’s the beauty that I seek!
As my fungal toe and its mate,
Which I condemned as reprobate,
Conceals within their ugly form,
Their freedom’s right against the norm!
© 1-18-15 ~First Place~
For Hidden Beauty Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Rhonda Johnson-Saunders
*Meant as a metaphor for those who don't appear as normal looking!
People in my school have names for someone like me.
Freak, crazy, weirdo, a spawn by the devil's decree.
I took note of every malicious word they ever spoke,
knowing that before long they'd no longer make me a joke.
None of them knew how truthful were their mocking words.
They had no clue I could spread my wings to fly among the birds,
with ravens that caw out for blood at the stroke of each midnight.
I'd fill their haunting dreams with images of daunting fright.
A snip of dried herbs, a pinch of fungal root, boiled in fat of fowl,
a concoction for me to savor, secreted to me by my mother, an owl.
Eyes that see through bloodshot color, they would see them too
when the full moon was high and the sky turned dark cobalt blue.
No help will they receive from a scream or gyrations to be free.
They soon will know they should never have made a mockery of me.
The time is near, my brew is cooled, now it's my time to have fun.
Tonight their dreams will be nightmares, a gift from the evil one.
With their eyes closed, they will envision they are being chased
by hundreds of bloodshot eyes, the likes of which they've never faced.
Black robes adorned, scepter of wormwood waved from my hand.
Eyes... wild bloodshot eyes, will seek vengeance at my command.
Fog advances to the bedrooms of those who sleep in peace.
My adrenaline is pumping, just a few more minutes until release.
A snarl of satisfaction I feel curled upon my blood red lips.
You won't belittle me again with your taunting nocuous quips.
NOW! I gave the order for the eyes to creep into their dreams
But my heart is beating too fast. This was not part of my schemes.
I can't see a bloody thing. What's happened to the spell I cast?
How long will this blindness torture me? How long must it last?
A truant officer was sent to see what had become of the freak.
Through a window he saw many ravens, all with bloodied beak.
No body was discovered. All that remained was a robe of black
and a note scratched upon the floor. "Too late to take it back."
::::::::::::::::::::::::::
December 26th, 2015
Deep and Dark Contest
Sponsor: Broken Wings
Constructing Catacombs
Desirous death, a submersed breath, the walls in a carious crumble
Living life, a surgical serrate strife, as we stand surreal and stumble
Baneful blood, a feverous flood, the temerarious towers will tumble
Terranean tears, fertile fermenting fears, a famished fatalistic fungal
Corpses mounting high, Angels in the sky, reuniting dead and divine
Perpetual praying, love’s lost laying, as we build their sacred shrine
For we question why, we deceitfully die, within the abortifacient vine
Blue clouds of clay, casually chip away, as the minstrels drink their wine
The new Babylon, do we belong, beyond death's door is still unknown
Faith be quick, do we get to pick, a heaven or hell that we have sewn
Odious obstruction, of deaths destruction, mankind comes to mourn
Caught in oblivion, a denunciative delirium, and thus we are reborn.
Nov.08.2017
PREMIERE CONTEST NO 110
Sponsored by: Brian Strand
Sam is a novice gardener who stamps on all ants
He doesn't like them near or crawling on his plants
Their Queen was angry and wanted revenge
For the ones that had fallen she wanted to avenge.
They planned to get inside and under Sam's clothes
Cover his whole body from his head to his toes
The queen gave her order for her ants to attack
Every inch of his body, every orifice and crack.
There were flying ant squadrons in groups of twelve
Soldiers in lines and a lone scout out by himself.
The others were preparing for a mass swamping
While Sam continued with his clomping and stomping.
They entered inside both trouser leg realms
These little feisty red insects, these hardcore rebels
From somewhere inside it was smelly and breezy
And their night vision eyes made navigation more easy.
Sam's legs were hairy and wiry, like a hot tangled jungle
With volcano like spots and some weird looking fungal.
They battled there way through, this united strong army
While Sam was going mad and looked rather barmy.
They bit, they chewed, they spat and tickled
Sam smacking himself as he wriggled and wiggled
At all times they were all on high red alert.
To avoid being splattered by this mad dancing berk.
These tiny ninja assassins crawled under his shirt
His four limbs wildly failing; he went completely berserk
Flying ants swooping and diving to created a distraction
Sam's reaction to their actions gave them great satisfaction.
He jumped, he hopped, he twice did the splits
They bit here and there, including his small naughty bits
His limbs in and out; the ants hokey pokey
Limbs moving so fast they felt hot and smelt smokey.
Sam screamed "I am sorry please leave me alone
My garden is yours and every ants home
I didn't know aphids left you a sugary sweet treat"
I surrender, I give up, I admit my defeat."
Harmony and peace, balance restored
Nothing is mightier than a little ants sword
Sam's body now healed, no more ants in his pants
But beware if you ever harm a red or black ant.
04.06.24
Star- like, fiery symmetry,
strong suggestion of a flower
but a betrayal of beauty
suspended on a
flesh- pink, chrichoid stalk,
A manifest illusion
of blood and mud
Brilliant, strange- compels the questions.
What silent signal from the dark ether
opened the vile smelling blossom?
Was it borne forth from dormant spores,
its genesis sprung from hidden fungal roots?
A vision encountered by chance
A shocked foot held suspended
over this wonder, now transposed
to a flower in nightmare dreams.
3/28/2016
You say Trim Shady come out and play
but Shady aint around no not today
that alter ego went away away to stay
I'm crazy maybe taking on a lady
but here now so hip hip lets slay.
Now Brenda remember
you're just a tender member of the opposite gender
a ghetto gangsta pretender
that I can slam and mash and rename Blenda
and then drink to remain Trim and slender
you'd think I'd stop the slander but
you created a demand for banter
and I'm a year round Santa
present with presents that when I present
generate laughter like America
flying your Tard Spangled Banner with your hand on your heart
your anthem is British and your flag looks like childrens art.
And though we're a pond apart
you will only ever be as lethal as a leaf in free fall
leaving a tree that is leaning deceased and peaceful.
There's a horrendous fungal flap with a flammable feaces in all your pieces
it never ceases while my skill only increases
you smell like cheeses off one of Jesus's pizzas
a pizza that's old, Jesus does that have to be told
you asked and I came and beat ya burned and lol'd at ya,
you wanted to play, well hip hip hooray, I played today!
A whispering word is a whispering void cantering over airspace. Clear but unclear. Oh the sheer detectable ideology of the fungal worm. Chitter chatter consume. Consumption is the eruption. And like a fine wine to a palate leaves no bereft anarchical wonderful wound. It leaves only a blemish you see. Wipe away and wield and wield. Surely only in a field is one golden shard shirt obtained through an era of cataclysmic canals. And now the peace of the sound injects and vibrates the atmosphere with simple yet symbolic and symmetrically placed soul speak. And so medicine is delivered to the gatherings at many a synchronization and talking cannot halt the dosage. And idle is the bows that do not shout or shoot. And to interrupt a single layer of brain peanut style is to merely swim backstroke against a myrtle current of which is called time. Collaborative collisions then. Good. Youthful digestive tunnels but as yet no turrets. Bouncing booming boogie bongos. Waves of impassive moods.magically magic majestic morphological moods. Xxxxxx ever since a baa comes an array.........savour not a salt and salute no angel for angel is an angel and anglers waltz in a very highly driven snow. So hahahahaha lumps of pressure means a tyre washing in progress....hahahaha mean not a mingle....hahahaha elevated eon.....hahaha and hohoho honourable hideous hundred xxxxxx inconspicuous..z
Shush Sushobhan,
she’s pushing her hand to my rock hard in the back of reception
your girl wowing at my fat long perfection,
I guess she thinks of you as rejection
after you spent a fortune forging affection,
less valued than my shlong.
Meanwhile slow and little brains porky pig
my circuit short twig tool of a boss is on an investigation
overpowered by resentment she gets my attention,
such minute intelligence reveals her intentions so evident,
I could read signs and tell of pending events,
whilst she's happy to believe I was unaware and dense.
I've cotton on to your rotten pong wanting me gone
and plotting for so long, me out witting miss puppet for the job,
accusations she'd lob
ridiculously smitten with my downfall,
now for your downfool…..
Think you’ve done better cus you ass lick more,
you’re brainy like a fruit basket whore,
That Greek bloke dumped you and not one man showed interest
it's because you’re a character men detest,
ugly with clothes on, mental scars undressed,
personality like a side dresser past it’s best,
beast and the beast misses fungal yeast,
walking around in a black suit putting yourself on the radar
put a helmet on your ugly face you’d be like Darth Vader,
no I mean,
a daft failure,
you think you're important
cus you're mentally dormant,
job performance level of slumber
dumb and dumbers dumb dumbster,
means, you are the dumbs dumped dumb stuff,
moustache and bum fluff, dog bark rough.
Let’s meet up again and see if you play those games,
now you’ve no title, see who reigns falls, up yours.
(We may appear to be different we all belong to GOD, Now Realize That)
A young boy sat down by the roadside
Watching all of the other children playing
He let out a long and lonesome sigh
All of the sudden the wind came by and blew his cap from his head
The child ran as fast as he could trying to hide the shiny spots on his head
Without showing the world all of his dread
For the other children's parents did not understand his condition
Thinking it was quite contagious and forbade their children to play with him
Hence, the saddened young boy ran as fast as he possibly could
It seemed as though he could not bear it any more
Because of the stares from those who hadn't understood
Finally a little girl wearing all white held out her hand
She didn't show fright for she too was in need of a friend
She promised his honor she would defend --
He asked her name she replied "Alopecia Know Moore"
She then claimed that she'd come down to even the score.
The little boy exclaimed "Oh how will you ever do that!"
She replied, "by re-educating those ignorant people and their brats!"
So, she began to sing a song loud and strong
This led them to believe that their thinking was wrong.
"You couldn't catch it like ring n' de worm
Or all de fungal diseases that make one squirm"
Soon all sat back and relaxed while she put their minds at ease
She had caught their attention for sure, and then she began again,
“The condition is one that attacks the immune system
Through the hair follicles... this young boy you should not tease
For his beauty shines brighter than any of you here --
So what, if he has only loss a little bit of hair;
His handsomeness shines like a beacon from within
You can't catch it if you rubbed his skin
You'd might learn to love him, if you'd just make him your friend."
The children look round at their parents with inquiring eyes
Wondering why they had told them such lies
The parents became ashamed allowing the children to become friends
They all found that day that beauty lies deeper than ones skin
Through the re-education they now know
More about Alopecia and made some new friends...
Here we are,
my Bright-Light -
The Slow Discotheque.
Connect your contacts to the mob-mind,
dig the soft-focus that feels like an old future.
Leave your shoes and stockings
by the door,
my Bright-Light -
the spongy fungi carpet
will leave your feet cleaner
than when we came in.
Try the honeysuckle,
my Bright-Light -
it comes in three flavors,
hard to describe without glyphs.
The dialects of the discotheques
drift from ecosystem to enchanted ecosystem.
Drink deep -
or do not -
the tab is infinite
as long as we’re alive.
Our payment is our body heat.
The plants eat infrared here.
Nothing leaves here hungry.
Everything gets its fill.
Take off that vestige of a bustle,
my Bright-Light,
We’re about to dance,
and the nettles need something to prick.
The music is very slow here,
my Bright-Light -
only the plants
dance to it raw.
We get it filtered,
but if you tune in to the right trail,
and breathe deep,
you catch something like phrases -
phrases of thanks.
They bask in us,
here in our near-dark
of The Slow Discotheque -
their adapted-dawn
of The Slow Discotheque.
Let us...trade,
my Bright-Light,
exchange
energy for music,
waste heat for wonder,
sweat for sweet nectar.
Let us...dance,
my Bright-Light,
in microscopic movements,
mambas whose grooves
only slime mold can nod to.
And at the break,
my Bright-Light,
spoon with me,
my Bright-Light,
on the fungal floor
of this Slow Discotheque,
Let us rest awhile,
let the hyphae taste us,
imprint our receipt -
their thanks -
upon us
in spore patterns
blazing in the ultraviolet.
Let us go now,
my Bright-Light,
covered in information,
craving the next disco
(what lovely lie, never leaving hungry)
Let us kiss,
go home,
do the waggle-dance
to remember where we were.
Let us go,
my Bright-Light,
and spread the spores.
Let us go,
and boogie slowly
to the hits
of the hot plants.
Autumn Fall
Jack Frost is waiting to weave his mischievous magic
Amongst the changing flora lays an endless carpet of vibrant purple heather, its sweet note sings in the cool air
Brown and yellow paint flecks adorn the smallest leaves
Multi-coloured toadstools and mushrooms spark vivid memories of magical childhood dreams
Pixies and fairies will soon come out to play!
Autumn fall nights come alive with a waltz of neon blue and red
Tiny creatures play impish games in their nocturnal fungal playground
Olive, lime, emerald colours paint the forest floor in vibrant shades of green
I walk bare footed, feeling the cool moist spring of moss massaging my soul
The air is damp and chilled, full of the familiar scent of the Earth’s musty aroma
Birds sing, piping a Highland symphony welcoming another seasonal chapter
I feel so alive, ready to embrace more of nature’s ever changing breathtaking wonders.
An offering from my slush-pile in lieu
of anything new
Santa’s sleigh crash landed in the jungle
He got caught in the branches of a tree
He had a wound that could be turning fungal
And sought help from a passing chimpanzee
The chimpanzee was friends with a gorilla
Who said, “You don’t belong up in this tree.”
And Santa said, “Now look, I’m not Godzilla,
So will you or the chimpanzee help me?”
The chimpanzee said, “Ooh-ooh, aah-aah, ooh.”
So Santa bellowed loudly, “Ho Ho Ho!”
The gorilla slapped his hand across his forehead,
“If you’re both talking nonsense I shall go.”
So Santa built a grotto in the jungle
He taught some marmosets to work as elves
A job that Santa hoped they wouldn’t bungle
And soon they would be putting toys on shelves
But then he pulled his sleigh with lions as reindeer
That was an error (soon he’d have the proof)
Although we don’t get snow or freezing rain here
Those lions and the sleigh fell off the roof
When Santa hit the ground his head was foggy
He yelled, “You lions are a bunch of peasants
Each one of you is just a clumsy moggy
So dumb you can’t deliver children’s presents.”
Their Christmas lunch so juicy that it squelched
The lions ate their fill then licked their paws
One lion looked embarrassed when he belched
And then said, “Oops, we’ve eaten Santa Claus!”
Consuming brain waves from plentiful touch
Exchange of sorrow, mirth, and incredulous dirges
Following the sign of the times
Discourse as it reeks from chest cavities
Angsting bloated bodies barrelled into walking murmur
You sleepy disease fungal fortunes run amiss
Runinous with divisive claims