mushroom god

  Slim Bierko plays, in sympathetic synthesis,
the organ of his dear departed sister.
(She died while seeing visions
induced by her communion
with the mushroom god that lived inside her head.)
Slim plays the tunes of childhood
commingled with some disco
and a little bit of soft synthetic pop.
He doesn’t really like it (he’d rather play some jazz) but
it’s the only way to make the feeling stop.

Dirk, listening intently,
believes that he’s begun to understand the sounds that Slim is making
as he plays his sister’s organ,
but the mushroom god makes sure Dirk doesn’t have a clue.
Dirk, of course, is unaware
the mushroom god is even in the room.

The mushroom god,
like other gods,
believes the music’s made for him.
Slim, in contradiction
to this prevailing fiction,
makes the music for his sister and his self.



Slim’s sister, in depression,
welcomed the escape that the mushroom god provided.
The feeling that the world was someone else’s oyster
was nothing really novel to Sue Anne.
She’d been to other places and seen lingering traces
of the happiness of others in the land,
but when she examined her life for
the things she’d come to want
she counted them on someone else’s hand.

When she ate the mushroom god
he made her feel both odd and awed
and the mushroom god, in gratitude,
made a home inside her head.



The mushroom god, in his paternal wisdom,
has decreed that Slim will play upon
Sue Anne’s Hammond organ in a way
not everyone will try to understand.
Slim doesn’t understand the compulsion or the demon
that the mushroom god has planted in his head,
but he plays the tunes of childhood,
commingled with some disco
and a little bit of soft, synthetic pop.
He doesn’t really like it (he’d rather play some jazz), but
it’s the only way to make the feeling stop.

Dirk sits in quiet contemplation of the memory of
Sue Anne, dwelling on the eerie
sound that echoes in his head.
The mushroom god makes sure Dirk doesn’t have a clue.
Dirk, of course, is unaware
the mushroom god is even in the room.

The mushroom god, in his addiction,
like some other gods in fiction,
enjoys the music Slim has made for him.
The mushroom god, like other gods,
prefers to think the music is for him.



Slim and Dirk and dead Sue Anne
are never going to understand.
Slim and Dirk will start the day
(next morning, when he’s gone away)
as if the mushroom god was but a dream.



Slim will forget the tunes of childhood,
and he never much liked disco
or the soggy sound of soft, synthetic pop.
He’ll only play his jazz most days
but it will not make the feeling stop.

Dirk will go to Hollywood in search of something better.
He will not want to hear the sounds
old Slim is putting down.
Dirk never really understood.
The mushroom god (in case I haven’t mentioned it)
made sure he didn’t have a clue.
Dirk was always unaware the mushroom god was even in the room.

The mushroom god will feed his prediliction
like some other gods in fiction,
for the pleasures that some mortals can provide.
It’s nothing new to humankind that
the mushroom god (like other gods)
prefers to think the music is for him.