The night is still too warm, North of twenty – Far too warm to sleep, And through my open window, all the scents Are on the rise. The Moon is full enough, the curtains open, Birds are yet to peep, So I slip-on a tee-shirt, vaguely hoping I can catch a prize. In the kitchen, dregs of last night’s wine Are worth a swig, Then out into the garden, free of sunshine – Less oppressing… A hawkmoth buzzes audibly around the trumpets – Wow, it’s big… Now this is how Summer should be – less a slump, And more a blessing.
Flowering plants give birth to their grandkids, Two generations on. Between them, a haploid stage in birthed, And breeds, and dies in a matter of hours. It’s evolution at play, and history, Old ways still acting upon – The hidden generation, That is lurking deep within the bowers.
The parent cells, barely ten in total, Died at the point of conception – But isn’t the same as true in animals ? Well, yes…and no. The thing is, they have further stripped their gametes down To uni-perfection – No longer build a multicellular form, They have no need to grow.
But mosses and ferns, they still do it old school – Separate independent stages – And algae can even be free-living – Single, double, single, double… So botanists have marvelled, And have filled their textbook pages – But have drawn the line at animals, To spare them family trouble.
Yet I suppose there’s one more diff’rence – If the egg and sperm that made me Were my parents…well, that means, My parents are within me to this day – They gave their lives, and gave their haploid matter To upgrade me – So my generation has it easy, Born with twice the DNA.
Botanists like to point out how the ancestral condition of alternating between haploid (one set of chromosomes) and diploid (two sets) each generation still exists in flowering plants, but in a very reduced form. And it is true that pollen contains two-to-three cells, and the ovule seven, making them both technically multicellular.
And yet zoologists never seem to mention that the same is true for animals, only here the haploid generation has been reduced even further – now both gametes are single-celled, and their entire mass is consumed by the emergent zygote rather than withering away like all of the haploid plant material bar the two nucleuses. I guess they’ve got to draw the arbitrary line somewhere…
When the daffodils go over Then the Spring is on the way ! And though it’s sad to see the yellows wilt, At least they had their day. Once the clover is in clover, Then the bulbs are all long done – But Springtime has been built upon Their early yellow sun.
When the bluebells have stopped ringing, Then the Spring is truly here And though it’s sad to see the mauve-lings fade, At last they gave good cheer. Once the tulips have stopped singing, Then the bulbs have done their work – And it’s time to let the first watch fade And once more softly lurk.
The daffodils are blooming In my window-box again, Just to show that Spring is looming In the face of icy rain, They sprout besides my sill once more In planters perched on high, As they cheer my second floor, And bring a garden to the sky.
The daffodils are blooming In my window-box again, But they turn their heads from booming Through the gloomy window-pane. Instead, they stare at Winter Sun Where all their real focus is. I think next year, to stop the shun, I’ll just grow crocuses.
The only way to dine on garlic Ev’ry day or two, Is to only visit friends who dine on garlic Just like you. So lace that bolognese another clove, And stir it in that fry, And then be sure to bring your friends around your stove To have a try. And don’t be so afraid to say très bon When sharing peppy dips – And don’t be shy to relish it when tasted on Another’s lips.
We’ll still grow trees on Mars, Under the domes, And rooted in thin soil – We’ll take nuts to the stars And distant homes, To shade our fervent toil. Beside potato fields, And stands of wheat, They’ll ease the barren crag – Not for their timber yields Or fruits to eat, But just to plant our flag.
It only takes an acorn, That’s not too much weight To build a tree. And ev’ry sapling born Shall grow up great In lower gravity. Yet forests don’t get lush Till many years Of Martian peace have been – I guess we’re in no rush To clothe our spheres, And turn the red to green.
Which trees, though, all depends – Can pine withstand ? Or deserts raise a beech ? We nurture ev’ry friend In ev’ry land Our giant leaps shall reach. And thus, we’ll leave a trace From overseas That shows we once came by. We’ll still grow trees in space, Because the trees Have reached-up to the sky.
I’ve heard that oak will make a hedge If planted it in a row, But I’ve never seen a single stretch – Perhaps it’s just too slow. Or hedgers baulk at pruning oaklings back To make a wall, When ev’rything about them says ‘Don’t hack, But grow me tall.’
Out there in the wood Is the old oak tree, Just lapping-up the sunshine, All of it for free. But there in its branches, There lies the mistletoe, Just sucking-up the sap Of its clueless host below. And there on this shrub Is a little caterpillar, That’s munching on the leaves Like a cute and stealthy killer. And inside of the bug there lurks The grubling of a wasp, As it chews-through the organs, Squatting like a boss. But inside the grubling Is another, smaller maggot Of a teeny-tiny wasplet That will wear it like a jacket, And inside of the maggot Is a nematody worm, And further inside that There is a microscopic germ Of a fungus, creeping silent Through the gut-within-the-gut, Which is home to a bacterium That spawns itself in glut, And yet even that must make space To the lurking of a phage, Which is suffering from oxygen That tears apart its cage. So they each are chowing-down, And they each are getting fatter, Till they burst-out of the body, That they leave in such a tatter. But the enemies of enemies Don’t turn-out to be friends agen – Just ask the plague that bit the fleas, Then bit the rats, then bit the men…
So, I asked AI if such a Russian doll is possible, and it thought it was – though vanishly unlikley, and the length of time that all eight trophic levels could be ‘eating’ at the same time is a matter of minutes before one of the levels is killed.
Of course, inside of every cell in every multicellular-body’s body is the remains of a possible parasite, in the form of mitochondria. But over time, evolution tends to find that the healthier a parasite can leave its host, the better the tenant does as well. But bacteria can get in on the act as well, with their viruses that would co-opt their landlords into making a sex pilus to infect other neighbours, and accidentally carried across some of their host’s DNA with them and thus enabled the unintended spread of antibacterial resistance…
Humans have been farming fungus Since the old days of the Tang – The jellied-ear perhaps was first, And up the mycoculture sprang ! Shiitake and enoki, Grown on logs and straw and bran, Until in damp Enlightened France, The button mushroom crop began.
Strange, the Romans loved their fungus, Yet they never learned the knack – And the monks were so productive, Yet they only gave the yeast a crack. Although, it proved quite tricky Unless sterilized for pathogens – Far easier to forage in the woods That mess around with pens.
Meanwhile, folklore had been busy, Earthy names for ev’rything – Observe the toadstool and the stinkhorn, Bird’s-nest and the fairy ring. But where were all the memory-rhymes On which ones was it not worth risking ? Or how to tell a puffball From a death cap or a poison pigskin ?
Perhaps there are no generalities To indicate the vicious – One-by-one, we learn how white gills, say, Are deadly, or delicious. Ugly textures, noxious smells, May sometimes show vitality – Their looks do not align at all With fairytale morality.
These days, though, the urban myths Are more concerned with mould and spore, And in hallucinations, And the nuclear clouds of war. The time of the destroying angel’s Shrouded in mediaeval mist, Or from genteel whodunnits, Or a pith-helmet nat’ralist.
Humans have been farming fungus, Fascinated with their fruits – Not really understanding them, Yet sniffing truffles out of roots. These days, it’s all commercialised, To keep safe ev’ry cassarole, Without an unintended killer In our toadstool-in-the-hole.
The Chinese appear to have been farming Auricularia heimuer (aka the Black Wood Ear Mushroom) since the Tang Period (10618 – 10907 HE). They local name for it is ‘heimuer’, subsequently used as the species epithet. However, I have been unable to find any guide as to how this is pronounced. I think it may be something like high-moo-er, but that sounds more like a cow who has been feeding on a rather different kind of fungus…
Walking along the canal, I see the duckweed is in bloom – Bank-to-bank, a carpet For the mallards’ living room. The moorhens leave a wake of clear That slowly zips together, The swans have clumps upon their prows, And flecks on ev’ry feather.
Rivers are no good, of course, They hurry up their flow – But out on the canal, It teaches how to take it slow. The coots are scooping mouthfuls, And the geese are busy working – But beneath the green and stillness, I can sense there’s something lurking…
Rhyming Couplets 