Field Notes #2: Snakeroot Blooming
You are reading the weekly poetry newsletter, "Entangled Worlds: A Field Guide to Hope in a World Unraveling" by N.A. Chapman. Read more about it here.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, fellow waylark. Slow down. Slow down, and stay awhile. Dry off and warm yourself here by the fire. The storm outside is gathering strength, though the river knows we need the rain. What’s that? No, this is a stray and passing thing, this storm. Just as summer turns to autumn and winter to spring, so does strife turn to peace. Or, something nearer to it at least. Who can say when? Fate and the seasons have their own way about them. Second summers and false hopes abound. But between the curtains of rain, the golden light of fall shines through. Snakeroot blooms in late summer meadows, dazzling in a low and lazy sunbeam, besotted by bees. So take tomorrow’s honey with you. Let it be a balm for heavy hearts in the deepening dark. Let the light of early autumn fall upon you and count all the summer wildflowers growing in the fallen leaves.
Clockwise from top left: White snakeroot, wood ear mushrooms, way-leaf aster, and some mysterious shelf mushroom. | © N.A. Chapman
Snakeroot Blooming
The low lazy light
of autumn’s reverie
sends shadows dancing
upon the speckled forest floor.
The summer chorus is but a whisper.
Wood ears harden
from blood to bone.
Dry leaves and acorns
pummel the gasping ground.
The rot of strange fruit
burns.
The river flows backward.
Fallen trunks of some old
beasts
crack the shadow dance
and golden light shines
upon a thicket of snakeroot
blooms.
The golden air ripples
with a sea of bees
and a moth or two
drinking
tomorrow’s honey.
Amid decay,
the forest breathes.
Can you?
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