after the mosses display at the Glasgow Botanical Gardens

 

 

Common haircap with Elegant silk

            Slender bristle with Hart’s-tongue thyme

Springy turf with Fountain apple 

            Green yoke with Yellow fringe 

 

a delirium of lemon egg,

            sage sea, pea olive, leaf bark  

an undulating verdant spell  

            a hearty breakfast for elves

 

They are twelve species 

within a glasshouse exhibition   

teaching the ways of mossery, 

how to cover    spread    smell

 

their faery names, tenderly tickle 

countering grass with its blades, a touch

flirts like one body made for one kiss,  

            Frizzled pincushion with Silky forklet 

 

Yesterday, they were at our feet 

stomped by our boots while our heads  

were blinkered towards the castle

sold as the highlight of the highlands

 

their spongey squish a relief from

the cold stone to a basement

where the servants slept, cooked, ate,

separated by a litany of steep stairs 

 

Outside, we found lush toupees of 

Ripe pear with Butter leaf on the path

leading us away from the duke’s 1300

collectables – swords, pikes and muskets 

 

Mosses dappled safely  

            from a plague of invasive blooms 

with thorns hungry   

            for native seeds 

 

Today, the mosses are on show,

their thin cards claim proper

bio-identities, Plenogemma phyllantha 

with Syntrichia latifolia stay put 

 

while Blunt feather with Golden thread

trickle past the Victorian glasshouse

           exit onto the twenty hectares

           of manicured gardens

 

with bent heads

            we study 

                        their ground 

 

    our soles      

          uplifted 

by what they carry