Phalloid
In Latin, it's phallus impudicus;
in Anglo Saxon, stinkhorn.
And what would Cotton Mather say
spying the fleshy, white egg in the woods
as the penis emerges--shaft, glans, meatus--
the head green and sticky and reeking of death,
coated with spores the flies carry off--
and the mushroom, stripped clean, shrivels.
It is not--we know it's not--
a message from hell,
that faint gleam in the fallen leaves:
it's nature recycling form
and function--something we assumed
was human, and private
aroused in the dirt.
In Latin, it's phallus impudicus;
in Anglo Saxon, stinkhorn.
And what would Cotton Mather say
spying the fleshy, white egg in the woods
as the penis emerges--shaft, glans, meatus--
the head green and sticky and reeking of death,
coated with spores the flies carry off--
and the mushroom, stripped clean, shrivels.
It is not--we know it's not--
a message from hell,
that faint gleam in the fallen leaves:
it's nature recycling form
and function--something we assumed
was human, and private
aroused in the dirt.
From Season We Can't
Resist,
WordTech
Editions, 2007;
first published in Beloit Poetry
Journal.
Back to Poems page.