ST201902

ESCAPE (^) | EXPLORING
densely intertwined across its surface, fusing together
into one monstrous entity. It reminds me of a
nightmarish version of a Celtic decorative motif or
a creature whose skin has been removed to reveal a
tangle of bulging veins.
As I walk deeper into the woods, the form of the trees
becomes more extreme, some bend into right angles,
their furthest ends inseparable from their neighbours’,
a s if t hey have been f rozen in t he m idst of a gha st ly,
pagan dance. I have not travelled far from the path, but
the slight slope of the ground is the only indication of
the direction from which I’ve walked, and I feel as if
I could be eternally lost in this forest.
Back on the path, a grazing russet-hued pony is
almost camouf laged against dry bracken, which is
glowing copper in the low sunlight. After the sharp
angles of the oaks, the scene’s roundness and warmth is
comforting. As I walk westwards, away from the woods
I look out in the direction of the Bristol Channel across a
wide, curved hill. Low hanging clouds cast wide, dark
shadows over its mass, transforming it into the body of a
blue whale or into the sleeping ‘Groke’ from Tove
Jansson’s Moomin books. In the foreground, a leaf less
rowan tree is illuminated by sunlight, its bare branches
shine like gold filigree against the blue hulk of the hill.
A dip-like fold in t he g round to my lef t , inspires me to
leave the main path. This crevice becomes a dry ditch,
which deepens as the path continues, a holly bush
sprouts from its base and moss-coated oak roots emerge
on the surface of its banks as they steepen. Soon the
path is rising steeply and the twisted-witch arms of the
oak trees I was surrounded by earlier emerge from the
deep chasm – the ground’s lack of f lat surface causing
them to point out at even more ridiculous angles. Their
bark is coated in bright green moss that is f luorescent in
the shafts of sunlight that shine like searchlights
through the gaps in the foliage beyond the ditch.
Turning my gaze slowly downward, I spy an oak
stump covered with shaggy fox-tail feather moss.
There are jagged protrusions where the bulk of the tree
appea rs to have been tor n away f rom it s ba se a nd t hey
emerge out of the moss like the dramatic summit of
a mountain range.
Patches of sta r moss sprout out of crev ices a nd,
looking down into the agreeable pattern it forms on this
miniature self-contained landscape, I am reminded of
the beauty that is waiting to emerge from this
temporarily unfriendly environment.