maeve.mossin Woods, Mosses & Roots · Galway ·
SnapshotBog road after the rain, wet stone and moss
Here's a thing. The rain stopped at four and I took the dog out the bog road before the light went and the whole place had turned up its volume, wet stone on the walls and the heather gone dark and that brown, almost sweet smell of the bog water in the ditches. On the old oak by the gate there's a grey, papery lichen. I rubbed a bit between my fingers and it smelled faintly sharp and woody, nothing like the soft moss underneath. The turf smoke from the houses came in last, low and slow, like a drone under the whole tune.
4 comments
cormac.bog
Turf smoke and wet stone. That's my granny's road in Offaly, every word of it.
wren.and.moss
Grey and papery on an oak could be the oakmoss lichen itself. The oakmoss page says it's a lichen, Evernia prunastri, that grows mostly on oak trunks and branches. I've been sniffing the oaks in my yard ever since I read that.
maeve.moss
Well, I'd no idea at all and I'll go back with the dog and give it a proper sniff, so I will.
aroha.rain
Here it's spring and the bush smells green and wet after every southerly, but no turf smoke. Sweet as though.