Ringworm and the Blue Madonna

It’s funny how things in nature create patterns. Frost on the windshield in the morning, white lichen on the jutting rocks in a scrubby Vermont field, repeating calyxes of dried knapweed and spent goldenrod. Then there are the circles of fungus growing on fallen trees. Everything makes a pattern, even ringworm. After all these years I discover that ringworm is just a fungus. Funny how a word like that with all its implications can loop around and return in patterns in my memory.