S. E. Bartholomew @Phytopoetry tweeted a four-verse poem in response to my painting!

The montage of four tweet screenshots reads:

Phakopsora sighs as it settles on leaves

After it’s ride on the blustery breeze

The appresorial peg makes plants beg

To be spared from this rusty trial

But let’s be candid, if the spores have landed

You’ll have hyphae in a short while!

———

Stomatal gates are the usual place

Where leaves are prone to failure

But this rusty spore sailor cuts cell walls like a tailor

Now with moisture and heat and a bit of time

Many more spores soar towards northern climes.

———

Riding a hurricane across the equator

Sentinel plots kept rust on the radar

While chem companies fomented formulations

For emergency fungicide crop applications

———

So if you’re headed south

Punch ol’ rust in the mouth

Saying “Give those soybeans a break

But since your pusty old spores

Have come to these shores

You can have all the kudzu you can take”