Giles Watson's poetry and prose
Bladderworts
Bladderworts
The moss draws water, a thirsty sponge
Plastered over granite, inches thick,
The air above it slick with moisture.
Flowers, gorged as arteries, hang
Like heads of sanguine puppets
From stems pulsing with redness,
And like the scales of some reptile,
Green but blushing, bladders
Cobble the moss, gleaming
With a film of wetness. Beneath,
Crustaceans swim among the moss stems,
Microscopic. Bladder mouths
Gape like jaws, toothed with bristles:
One brush with a branched antenna,
And the valve-trap springs.
Sucked inside, the sealed door slams.
Prison walls exude
The juice of death.
Source material: Bladderworts (Utricularia spp.) are aquatic and semi-aquatic insectivorous plants. This poem describes an Australian species, Utricularia menziesii, observed in August 2005 near to the Point Possession walking trail, Albany, Western Australia. Poem by Giles Watson.
The sound recordings at the beginning and end of this film are toadlets, which live in cracks and holes in the granite where the Utricularia grows. One such toadlet can be seen here:
www.flickr.com/photos/29320962@N07/4737931809/
Bladderworts
Bladderworts
The moss draws water, a thirsty sponge
Plastered over granite, inches thick,
The air above it slick with moisture.
Flowers, gorged as arteries, hang
Like heads of sanguine puppets
From stems pulsing with redness,
And like the scales of some reptile,
Green but blushing, bladders
Cobble the moss, gleaming
With a film of wetness. Beneath,
Crustaceans swim among the moss stems,
Microscopic. Bladder mouths
Gape like jaws, toothed with bristles:
One brush with a branched antenna,
And the valve-trap springs.
Sucked inside, the sealed door slams.
Prison walls exude
The juice of death.
Source material: Bladderworts (Utricularia spp.) are aquatic and semi-aquatic insectivorous plants. This poem describes an Australian species, Utricularia menziesii, observed in August 2005 near to the Point Possession walking trail, Albany, Western Australia. Poem by Giles Watson.
The sound recordings at the beginning and end of this film are toadlets, which live in cracks and holes in the granite where the Utricularia grows. One such toadlet can be seen here:
www.flickr.com/photos/29320962@N07/4737931809/