Liverwort : 無料・フリー素材/写真
Liverwort / Giles Watson's poetry and prose
| ライセンス | クリエイティブ・コモンズ 表示-継承 2.1 |
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| 説明 | Digitally enhanced photograph. I wrote the following poems on cryptogams in response to a request from Anna Tambour, and they are featured on her excellent blog at:medlarcomfits.blogspot.com/2009/05/bryophytes-and-grandmo...She has also done me the kindness of writing a very encouraging essay on my poetry, at:medlarcomfits.blogspot.com/2009/05/giles-watsons-poetry-l...MARCHANTIAAs deep a green as my liver is redAnd lobed with equal fleshiness,Liverworts line the meadow-drainWith their slick upholstery:Slithers of thallus, anchoredBy watersoaked rhizoids,Their surfaces gleaming,Wet as vulvas, dripping dewBack into the stream. Each plantWears its sex on a stalk:Primed gametophytesWaiting for rain.Next year, they will invadeOur grandmother’s greenhousePerversely scaling the potsOf tropical orchids, their gobletsGorged with mist condensed:The females stellar, rayed;The males spreading parasols,Shading a refracted sun.Source material: Marchantia polymorpha is the largest British liverwort, and is commonly regarded as typifying all the main characteristics of the order Marchantiales. It often colonises the banks of streams, but is equally at home in heated greenhouses. The upper surface is typically covered in goblet-shaped organs, and the gametophyte tissue is borne aloft on stalks, or peduncles. Male and female plants grow as separate individuals. See Arthur J. Jewell, The Observer’s Book of Mosses and Liverworts, London, 1955, pp. 27-28. POLYTRICHUM COMMUNEA little neat besom,Pliant, well-combed,Chestnut colouredAs maidenhair,Dusts the wainscotAnd chandelier,Hanging and tapestry,Curtain and rug:A little neat besomThat grew in a bog.A little tough basketFor gathering of roots,Woven of Silk-WoodWound in a plait,Carried the provender – Oyster and snail,Ripe hedgerow fruits – For a legion five-score:A little tough basketThat grew on the moor.Source material: Maidenhair and Silk-Wood are vernacular names for the moorland moss Polytrichum commune, which grows in tussocks to a height of twelve to eighteen inches. The first verse is inspired by Gilbert White’s Natural History of Selborne, Letter XXVI, November 1st 1775, which describes the besoms which local people made using Polytrichum. Much of the vocabulary of this first verse is White’s. Richard Mabey’s edition of White’s book mentions that a moss besom of this type can still be seen in Sir Ashton Lever’s Museum. The second verse makes reference to an archaeological find: a basket woven of Polytrichum, found in the Roman fort at Newstead, Roxburghshire. It seems likely that the tradition of making baskets out of this moss is of considerable antiquity, and it is thought that the Newstead find is of native British workmanship, although it was no doubt pressed into service by the Romans, whose culinary tastes are reflected in its imagined contents. (See Paul Richards, A Book of Mosses, King Penguin, London, 1950, pp. 31-32.) |
| 撮影日 | 2009-05-20 18:25:00 |
| 撮影者 | Giles Watson's poetry and prose , Oxfordshire, England |
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| カメラ | E8700 , NIKON |
| 露出 | 0.008 sec (1/120) |
| 開放F値 | f/3.8 |