Poetry at the GAFFI Launch
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During the launch of GAFFI last week (6th November) Rupert Everett read a series of poems each of which related to fungal disease in a different way. There were several new original works - perhaps most poignantly one written by a group of patients who have aspergillosis in its various forms and who meet once a month for a support meeting run by the National Aspergillosis Centre.
The Centre has a Poet in Residence (Caroline Hawkridge) who organises group writing events to take place at the meeting. The poetry is inspired by a number of influences, one by the hospital car park(!) but this one was inspired by the name of the daughter of a doctor who presented a talk at one of the meetings. Her name was Hope and from that we all contributed to the poem 'Hope is...' giving our individual impression of what hope means to each of us. There was a wide range of contribution, some from patients, some from carers and some from staff.
Rupert performed our poem outside the Houses of Parliament as video recording is not normally allowed within its walls. Watch & listen here (once on the website click on Rupert's picture).
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Decomposition: An Anthology of Fungi-Inspired Poems
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29 May 2010 / Fungi Magazine
Decomposition: An Anthology of Fungi-Inspired Poems edited by Renée Roehl and Kelly Chadwick (2010) Lost Horse Press: Sandpoint, Idaho.
Anthologies of poetry are created to chronicle a movement or to gather poems on a single subject or theme. There are poetry anthologies on war, love, death, food, and a host of special topics. With the publication of Decomposition, we now have a superb collection of poems that derive from the perception that the fungi have much to teach us about the surrounding universe and life itself. Fungi-inspired poems—is this so unusual? Poems celebrating flowers, trees, and gardens have informed literary traditions since Ovid and Chuang Tzu, for nature themes are universal in poetry the world over. We frequently find poems tucked away in mushroom club newsletters, primarily because mycophiles tend to open their lives to the devotion of fungi in every conceivable fashion. But the realization that mushroom-inspired poetry is itself a singular tradition, one that has largely proliferated underground or at the margins of literature, has had to await Roehl and Chadwick’s splendid collection of mushroom poems that have sporulated and fruited in a vivid wordscape of color and form.
Read the full review
Purchase the book
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11 irregular stanzas on trimming toenails by Kat Couch
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the first nail flies off like a seed
a dark germ inside
and plants itself in the sleeping grass
come May a full-grown toe
luscious and greening
brings grackles to the cottonwood
the second is a fractured nursery rhyme
a plump little piggy going to market
disfigured by a fungal rash
even the wolf crosses the street
to avoid him
about the third
the less said the better
a disappointment to his family
Disney wrote the fourth
a scimitar from the Arabian Nights
sharp as the thing
that sets it free
five, Dickensian
a washerwoman
proud and fat
a lawyer raised number six
home schooled she
argued a case
before the Supremes
regarding the rights of toes
seven was a sly serial toe murderer
the cutest of the bunch
motel owners remembered him
smiling
signing the check
eight ate
leather, loved one hundred
and fifty dollar
running shoes
nein, the philosopher
famously said after all
what is a toenail?
the tenth nail
from the big right toe, a cruel flagship
shoots a sliver across the lake
the ice just off
the geese lazy on rails
like amusement park rides
remember the girl who dragged herself
from the sea
(who can forget her)
where Dad's sperm roiled the water?
the lunatic seer of Babylon
warned us against this one:
you, Alea
the second apocalypse of love
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