The Child of Cloud and Stone

How curious is this world:
Some clouds are shaped like stones,
Some mushrooms spread like clouds, layer upon layer,
Some stones bloom like mushrooms, petal upon petal,
And some mushrooms are cloud and stone at once.

Such is the woodland Turkey Tail:
The hues of stone, the markings of the cloud;
Perhaps it is their child.

Once, it held a little stubbornness:
“I do not wish to dwell in the sky,
Nor change my shape a thousand times before the one I love.”

And yet, it carried a little softness:
“I do not wish to be cold.
I long to lean against a tree
And grow roots that breathe.”

And now I have met it here,
Upon a fallen trunk,
Ring upon ring,
As though stone had learned to dream like a cloud,
As if a cloud had finally consented to be still,
As if a tree had opened its final blossom.