Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, FUNGI, by CHARLES WHARTON STORK


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

FUNGI, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: What fascinates first a roving glance in the woods
Last Line: Too quiet else to charm a careless eye?
Subject(s): Fungi


What fascinates first a roving glance in the woods
Is fungi; they're so different, standing out
Like notes or colors in a higher key
Of values. Some are sconces fixed on trunks
Of withered trees, chalk-white against the black --
One wonders what strange candles may be set
By what strange hands to burn there after dark
With elfin phosphorescence. Then there are clumps
Of miniature green, yellow, purple, red,
Or brown pagodas clustered everywhere
About the mouldy roots, like pleasure parks
For Chinese fairies; and the waxen sheaves
Of Indian pipe, so delicately pale.

And yet they live on death. The whole wood lives
On death, but after death has been transformed
Through a wide gamut, has been purged with sun,
Cleansed with cool rain and purified with wind,
Then stored in earth to mellow for new life;
While the fungi -- but let them have their due:
Their flaunting colors make the deep star-moss
Look tenderer still, and all the flowers more chaste.
What hints as well the wonder of the big
Essential things, the primal forest art,
Too quiet else to charm a careless eye?





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