If Mushrooms Could Sing...

Jeff VanderMeer has uncovered a sound from the city of Ambergris and is inviting comments.

I've been doing my own investigations into sounds coming from underneath Ambergris (or maybe just less used chambers of my fevered mind), and after long hours spent sifting through the ruins of the Borges Bookstore, I have come upon a particularly curious piece of apocrypha, said by some to be a folk song of the mushroom-like gray cap people, and by others to be a fraud committed by a particularly untalented and violently defrocked Truffidian priest:
The Sounds of The Silence*

Hello gray caps, my old friends
I’ve come to live with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its spores while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of The Silence.

In restless dreams I walked alone
Beneath these streets of cobblestone
My stomach churned with aching cramps
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the green of
A glowing light
That split the night
And filled me a dread of silence.

And in the glowing light I saw
Ten thousand gray caps, maybe more
Mushrooms talking without speaking
Mushrooms hearing without listening
Mushrooms writing songs that voices never shared
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of The Silence.

'Shrooms, said I, you do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you
But my words like silent spores all fell
And echoed
In the wells of silence.

And the dwellers bowed and prayed
To the spore-born God they made
And I felt my mind warming
With a voice that was forming
And the voice said: The words of the prophets
Are written on the city's walls
And Zamilon's halls
And whisper'd in the sounds of The Silence.


*From section III of The Hoegbotton Guide to the Early History of the City of Ambergris by Duncan Shriek: "...upon Aquelus' return, the city of Ambergris lay empty, not a single living soul to be found upon any of its boulevards, alleyways, and avenues, nor within its many homes, public buildings, and courtyards." I refer you to Shriek's text for further details, though I do recommend consuming it with large grains of salt and frequent reference to more recent attempts to put Shriek's endeavors into perspective.

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