LESLEY WHEELER

Category: Mycocosmic

  • Poetic feet [sprained]

    Poetic feet [sprained]

    I visited my sister in NJ a little over a week ago–just before a few days’ vacation with my eldest child–and my sister was bruised and scraped from falling during a run. I, meanwhile, recently gave myself a sprained ankle by…walking on the beach? I have no idea, honestly. As a kid, I broke an…

  • A D.C. reading, ghost pipes, & more Dickinson

    A D.C. reading, ghost pipes, & more Dickinson

    My new mushroom-patterned dress and I will appear at Kramer’s in Washington, D.C., this Tuesday 7/22, where I’m reading at 7 pm with Steven Leyva and Tonee Mae Moll. (The dress is kind of retro and I think I look like a sci-fi 50s nurse in it, or maybe a waitress at a fungus-themed diner.)…

  • Dickinson’s fungal weirdness

    Dickinson’s fungal weirdness

    This Thursday, 7/17, at 6 pm Eastern, I’m reading with Nadia Alexis in a virtual series, Phosphorescence, hosted by the Emily Dickinson Museum. (Nadia’s great book Beyond the Watershed launched on the very same March day as my Mycocosmic so it’s been a pleasure to pair up a couple of times.) The reading is free…

  • Instead of patriotism, fungus

    Instead of patriotism, fungus

    I’m not feeling the red-white-and-blue this year, so I hereby give you an image of the very pink Barbie pagoda mushroom–Podoserpula miranda–from New Caledonia, image drawn from The Global Fungal Red List. You’re welcome. I found stories about its discovery when I was reminding myself of the names of mushroom morphologies for a novel I’ve…

  • Myco-outtakes

    Myco-outtakes

    First: the 75th anniversary double issue of Shenandoah launched this week! The website has been professionally redesigned, too (I’m so glad Beth secured funding for that just under the wire–universities are all belt-tightening now). I read and proofread the whole issue so I know for sure it’s terrific. I hope you’ll check it out. If…

  • Itinerant Poet with Toadstools, Witches, & Shame

    Itinerant Poet with Toadstools, Witches, & Shame

    Mycocosmic is now three months old. Since it sprouted, I’ve done twenty events, recorded a few podcasts, received some nice notice (here’s the latest lovely review, by K.B. Kinkel). Meanwhile I taught very-full-time and kept working to set up summer and fall events, although they’re scheduled more calmly. “How are you feeling about the launch?”…

  • The Judgement Card

    The Judgement Card

    For once this spring, I pulled a good hand–not that I’ve been checking in with the tarot often these days, but I like to find an hour when I can to ask the cards what I should be thinking about. It’s meditative, quiet, grounding. When I say “good” I really mean “not dispiriting.” Essentially my…

  • Dark corridors

    Dark corridors

    For the past few years, I’ve thought of this time of year as a lightless tunnel: from late April, when my mother died in pain, till Mother’s Day, after which grief shrinks back to a manageable size. This year, I see my sister suffering through this passage, but somehow I’m okay. Maybe it’s because I’ve…

  • Shimmer, steam, somatic, sciatica

    Shimmer, steam, somatic, sciatica

    A happy thing that happened a week ago Monday, the day before my Personal Pinched-Nerve Apocalypse (more on that soon). Adroit published my short essay “Mycelial Mind.” As far as maintaining the mental habits the essay describes: well, I’m still a seeker, and I guess that’s the point. The past week and a half brought…

  • Role model, mycelium

    Role model, mycelium

    Spring’s little revolutions are flaring in small-town Virginia. It’s been unseasonably warm, so on the streets around my house, the daffodils’ signage was rapidly outshouted by tulips, azaleas, and lilacs. We took a couple of walks in the woods, one at Brushy Hill where redbuds headlined, the other on back campus, where the news included…