The mycelium is breathing, my partner texts me, along with a photo of a fogged-up plastic bin. Yesterday, we buried everything. On the floor of my apartment, we soaked some aspen chips for substrate, broke up a mycelium-saturated grow kit into it, tossed the whole thing together with gloved hands.

I arranged the photos from my childhood on top. First, the photo of myself in a red brocade Chinese New Year outfit, and a photo of my mother making dumplings embroidered with a mycelium-like pattern. A giant image of a dumpling comprised of images of seven different dumplings superimposed, and similarly, a photo of an orange slice which is five orange slices superimposed. Finally, printed on transparent paper, some writing: the Poem in a Language and the Glossary. I know that the mushroom cannot “read” this, in the sense that I can. But I feel it is important to include regardless, in case a trace of the subject remains in the imagery.

Steam from the hot water used to hydrate the substrate curled the pages of my writing in on themselves, reminiscent of dead spiders, or mollusks. I know it's simply physics, but it looks biological, defensive—like a form of communication already.

connect

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substrate