Mycélium
Natural exploration, found poem in French and English…
Dans le langage
courant, un fil
que l’on suit sous le
sol feutrine pour se perdre
dans cette âme forestière,
invisible, dans cet univers
de filaments
ramifiés qui voyagent dans
le substrat
de nos cellules
allongées,
cloisonnées, à la naissance
de notre
différence —
la vide dans laquelle sont dispersés
nos rêves souterrains.
Ce que l’on appelle couramment
l’humain
n’est en fait que
ce mécanisme
de rêveries
d’un univers sombre
et fertile.
In common language
a thread
that we follow under the
felt floor, to lose ourselves
in this invisible forest
soul, in this universe
of branching filaments
that travel in
the substrate
of our cells
elongated,
separate, at the birth
of our
difference —
the void in which are scattered
our underground dreams.
What is commonly called
the human
is in fact only
this mechanism
reveries
of a universe dark
and fertile.
Author’s note: in this poem, I took inspiration from a book I was reading, The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak, and decided to bring something from the scientific/natural realm into my writing.
If you’re familiar with the novel, you already know that one of the characters is…a tree (and more than a tree). And if you haven’t read it (yet)? Well, consider it — and be prepared to be dazzled by all the natural phenomena that find their way into the story — and remind us what it means to be human. And maybe what our place in this world really is.
I found/created this poem by reading several articles on Mycelium like this one in English. And by taking words and expressions from this post on mycelium on Wikipedia. Maybe it’s a bit of research, maybe it’s just building vocabulary from the natural world into my stories…maybe someday I’ll write a story with a vast underworld being as a non-human character…
That’s the amazing thing about writing — you sit down for 10–15 minutes of exploration, but you never know where it will take you.
Thanks for reading!
And to see what’s on my reading list in 2022…
