The Mushroom Trail

Fungi bloomed in deepest woods
So curious, we stepped off track.
Enchanted by their curious hoods
We never once looked back.
Mist licked down their stalks and gills
As polish shining silver.
Fungi stretched ‘twixt leafy frills
All unique, yet quite familiar.
Twisting, oozing natures smelt,
Orange, creams and grey.
Transfixed we roamed and never felt
The sand grains fall away.

Such fools to chase haunted spores
Down the mushroom trail.
Adrift in cursed woods before
The air grew dank and stale.
Now lost beneath the looming beech,
Finding ever darker shade.
Till chasing a robin’s cheering tweet
We escaped the haunted glade.
Free at last, all fears allayed
As boots began to chaff.
But as we fled the strange charade
I swear I heard a hollow laugh….

By Dermy McNally

My thanks to the talented Floss Adams for use of her photography! (And for keeping the faith as we hiked headlong with four small children…)