Red Caps

Jul 31

Gaze upon the loveliness of our crimson spattered hills
The gentle rolling earth
dotted with lives of vibrancy
Duck underneath the lips of our fungal forest friends,
to share in their rosy shade
or shelter from the drizzly skies
But do not presume their hospitality has no limit;
they will entertain no trespass
against their ruby flesh.

Once upon a time, in a land of lush green and somewhat papery cascading hills, there lived a queen and her mostly loyal subjects. You see, the subjects, who all happened to be members of her extremely large family, could get away with quite a bit behind the Queen’s back, as she always wore a blindfold, and so could not see. Or so they thought. In truth, the Blindfold Queen, who covered her eyes in order to rule with perfect fairness, saw all that happened within the borders of her queendom with the eye inside her mind.

One misty Spring afternoon, the Queen and the True Royal Family chose to take a stroll through the Scarlet Forest. In every direction, as far as the eye could see or your feet could hope to carry you, the brilliant red caps of the mushroom trees lay sprinkled over the land. It was under the widest of these red caps that they took shelter when the drizzly rain came that late morning. They hunkered down, each lost in their own thoughts or books or naps or impatience, waiting for the rain to give way so they could return to the comfort of the Queen’s palace.

After some time, hunger began to gnaw away in their bellies, enticing them in turn to gnaw on the soft stalks of the fungi forest. They knew this was a bad idea. Nothing good ever came of eating the red caps, and quite a bit of bad might.

Meanwhile, on the far side of the kingdom…

•••

If ever a piece of mine begged to be turned into a fairy tale, it is Red Caps. The prompt for the art was “poison”. Research turned up a couple of interesting, venomous ideas - did you know that there’s a poisonous Cone snail that can sting you with the tip of its nose? A person can actually die from it! They live inside of some really pretty shells, which seems like some sneaky, bad form to me.

These red capped mushrooms called to me a little more clearly, thus here they are.

Red Caps waits to add fantasy to your life in the Art•Shop.