Third time's a charm? Second revision of SLIME MOLD for August 31 2023 Jill

[jill stockinger]

Will I Never be Done with SLIME?

Nedra helpfully pointed out-at least twice-that sagebrush does not belong in a poem of FORESTS. And that's True!

So I HAD to rework my poem. Again.  Jill

Here's my SECOND REVISION: 

Slime Mold by Jill Stockinger

 

The oozy slink, the noxious stink

of slime! Even hearing your name

creates a frisson of revulsion until

I see the camera’s time-lapsed

captures of your tight embrace

in your all-consuming love of earth.

You proceed at too infinitesimal

a scale for my coarse sight to register,

but those images, magnified five times

over, reveal your so-slow movements, 

one mere millimeter per hour, 

that cause the soft relaxation

and the letting go of strong, thick wood

into the becoming of fertilizing soil

and potent nutrients. Your sensitive,

questing filaments caress, engulf

and gently digest tree bark and 

circles of cambium; next, you patiently

eat your way through sapwood to reach

the rich, dense heartwood, all food

you use to produce a symphony

of decomposition which rises

with new saplings, moss and flowers.

Without your persistence,

the forest floor would be choked

by fallen limbs stacked high,

and under that increasing darkness,

no new trees would grow. How strange

that beings of your stature underlie

the growth of tall trees, ropes of green

ivy, showy white trillium, yellow

chanterelles and the fragrant coyote mint.