Laurence W. Thomas

Looking for Morels
  
I find enough in my yard each year
under the pines for one mess hot in their butter
and rich on the palate.  I am encouraged
to search this side of Mesick, mushroom capital
where the bars in season serve them.
 
Sometimes on the highway east of Mesick
it's hard to find a parking place.  The local news
goes there showing the wrinkled heads in the leaves
like encrusted jewels and swarms of treasure hunters
foraging in the woods like pigs after truffles.
 
Try around old elm trees I am told
so I go along past the fork in the road
where I found my dog running loose last year
past the junk dealer of marvelous finds
to where I have seen some elms still standing.
 
They were wrong about the elms I discover
and head down the public access road
to the hardwoods crowding around Ellis Lake
and search among the arbutus and trillium
and the more common Michigan lady slippers
 
and find nothing.  A bevy of ruffed grouse
startles me with a sudden burr of their wings
and as I leave with nothing to show for my search
a lone loon makes its way across the lake
trailing its maniacal quavering laughter.



Also from Laurence W. Thomas :
Think of Me
Crossing Mackinac Bridge

Contributor Bio

Laurence W. Thomas is founder and editor of Third Wednesday, literary arts magazine. A native Michigander, he has published ten books of poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, humor, and many poetry chapbooks. Thomas has published widely, is active in several local poetry groups, and lectures annually on poetry at the Lucidity Poets' Retreat in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.