Barbara Daniels Mushroom Armies

Mushroom Armies

Raked out, they bulge back— new breasts, cancerous brains. A fungus big as a plate falls

to ruin, sprouting a brush of soft blue hairs. Every night a fierce brigade lifts pallid arms,

spotted fists. Which can be eaten— beige umbrellas or pancakes sprinkled with cinnamon?

The newest mushrooms sprout rose caps. When I break their skin, they bruise

at once to Prussian blue. This means they’re poison. Yellowing jellies spill out

over dirt. I touch a puffball, releasing a breath of smoky spores. I won’t touch

the corpse plant’s clammy flower. A bee hurries into its cold white mouth

and blunders away, stunned by the waxy permanent chill.

Barbara Daniels

Barbara Daniels has received four fellowships from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, the most recent in 2020. She has had poems appear lately in Permafrost, Westchester Review, Philadelphia Stories, and others. A collection, Talk to the Lioness, was published in 2020.