Foraging
Two days after the first drenching rain
oyster mushrooms soften, go orange
for a day, their grip weakens
on the bark of the fir, they pink.
Morels stretch like full
sponges on the forest floor
and honey mushroom pop
from the soil like tethered balloons
around a child’s thin wrist.
For a few days, a week, they bloom
and spread, some gather
into underground runs on old roots
of dead pines and firs and break
ground in almost linear fashion.
Foragers pick a clump, drop
in canvas satchels or paper bags,
talking of soup, of terrain
that appears in the taste
of dead wood and forest decay,
and one says an oyster from the shore
tastes unlike any that’s been farmed,
that oyster mushrooms from an old fir
taste rugged, or like fatigue,
like the fir has been living so long
it tired of reaching for light.
Bio: Jeff Burt lives in Santa Cruz Country, California. He has previously contributed to Monterey Poetry Review, Sheila-Na-Gig, Heartwood, Willows Wept Review, and others. He has a chapbook, A Filament Drawn so Thin, from Red Bird Chapbooks, and a book The Root Endures due out from Sheila-Na-Gig in fall 2025. More can be found at www.jeff-burt.com
Two days after the first drenching rain
oyster mushrooms soften, go orange
for a day, their grip weakens
on the bark of the fir, they pink.
Morels stretch like full
sponges on the forest floor
and honey mushroom pop
from the soil like tethered balloons
around a child’s thin wrist.
For a few days, a week, they bloom
and spread, some gather
into underground runs on old roots
of dead pines and firs and break
ground in almost linear fashion.
Foragers pick a clump, drop
in canvas satchels or paper bags,
talking of soup, of terrain
that appears in the taste
of dead wood and forest decay,
and one says an oyster from the shore
tastes unlike any that’s been farmed,
that oyster mushrooms from an old fir
taste rugged, or like fatigue,
like the fir has been living so long
it tired of reaching for light.
Bio: Jeff Burt lives in Santa Cruz Country, California. He has previously contributed to Monterey Poetry Review, Sheila-Na-Gig, Heartwood, Willows Wept Review, and others. He has a chapbook, A Filament Drawn so Thin, from Red Bird Chapbooks, and a book The Root Endures due out from Sheila-Na-Gig in fall 2025. More can be found at www.jeff-burt.com
