From under the folding umbrella shade of a tree’s
midday full stop, what reveals itself to bright light
comes dressed in motifs. Of mud.
There are soldiers and mud, insects and mud,
then to the sticky and some to the liquid slip.
Some again to dust, dusting a dusky air for bats
owning the sonic flight path dart mirror
of daylight’s swallow and swift chasing eights
back and forward across the hatch.
All pulls to where, under the misty skin
a dark world forms sculptures to lift
from the shield of earth time. There,
the precious and protected sit in a soup
of sweet treats and warning signs, while muddy boots
and watery fields and roots have soaked. Soaking
through layers of ancestor, mycorrhizal mystery
networked like the salt marsh millions. Down,
through these sweet webs, fungal and root tongues
hold drunken or firm. Lush whisperings
in the delicate feathering patterns of water work.
Sweet growth in a grainy underwater hum and crunch.
A calcium rustle shells the root weave, turning
soft tunnel stretch-trenches that spread and head
towards the surface, fruiting spore songs. Gentling
there above, full leaf music glows. Drifts
an auburn tumble of greetings reaching towards
forms of phrase and chorus, shooting from below.