Severance

I think I have a cordyceps heart.

I can’t tell you how it       tastes or what colours

          it feeds on. But some nights,      I feel it

                                                        curl up into the shell

    of a garden snail. And it’s smooth

                    like freshly waxed grass. Maybe it’ll be fun

to squash it.               Make it pumpkin.

Give it a season to live in.            I want it to grow

                out of my eyes.               Make me a mushroom Medusa.

         Make me swallow the host

                                          like herbal chicken soup.        I’m nastier

than you think.       I can snip off my arm

          the way an ant                snips off its own head,

a popping

            tropical drink,      and in seconds,

                                                              I can kill a whole colony

                                                                           including myself.