Ancient Green is an essay in a recent issue of Emergence magazine.
It looks at mosses and their persistence throught the millennia, patiently growing over changes in the rocks. They have seen previous changes and they can give us some clues for the future and tell stories of the past.
A few extracts which I particularly liked:
They (mosses) cover the inanimate with the animate.Without judgment, they cover our mistakes, with an unconditional acceptance of their responsibility for healing. They’ve grown a bandage over the ground of Chernobyl, over mine waste and sludge ponds. There is a whole genre of photographic images of mosses in abandoned interiors, where dripping water and dim light create moss habitat out of human habitations. Broken windows and collapsing roofs invite a strangely beautiful carpet of bryophytes to upholster old couches and blanket beds of abandoned motels. For me, the most powerful of these scenes is the luminous mosses carpeting the conference room of a derelict Detroit office where the captains of gas-guzzling industry once conspired. The chairs where they plotted short-term exploitation have turned to long-term green.
They will cover the abandoned frack pads with the same tenderness as the bare rubble of a melted glacier. Mosses were the first plants to blanket the Earth. I wouldn’t be surprised if they are also the last.
They will cover the abandoned frack pads with the same tenderness as the bare rubble of a melted glacier. Mosses were the first plants to blanket the Earth. I wouldn’t be surprised if they are also the last.
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