This is a green and pleasant place,
ancient footprints cover its face,
traces of post-glacial diversity,
where wild boar, roaming free,
broke bracken, churned woodland
soil to muddy swamp, rooted around
in compost black and brown,
left wetland wallows overgrown
with hosts of rich and varied fauna,
and colourful explosions of flora.
Now, spring woods flood with bluebells,
diluting diversity of sight and smell,
their heady sweetness on the breeze,
ebbing and flowing between the trees.
Kim M. Russell, 30th November 2020
My response to earthweal weekly challenge: What Happens to One, Happens to Us All
This Monday’s challenge has been set by Sherry, who has written a fascinating essay about how nature is amazing, trophic cascades, and how wolves and salmon can change the course of a river. It’s an essay that should be read by everyone. Sherry said ‘every species has its important role to play in the working of whole ecosystems. The participation of each impacts the health of the whole’. Or, as her Nuu chah nulth neighbours teach: Everything Is One. What happens to one, happens to us all.
Sherry would like us to share any example of a human or non-human being and the impact it has on its surrounding ecosystem. We can share our wonder, despair, hope, respect, or whatever this challenge brings up for us.
Image found on Pinterest.
writing in north norfolk 
Ah those bluebells are beautiful, but are they lulling us into a false sense of security and forget what we’ve lost. A great response to Sherry’s prompt, Kim. I was lucky enough to meet a baby boar on Montserrat once (and lucky enough not to meet its mother!)
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Thank you, Ingrid. I have never met a old boar. I imagine baby ones are cute.
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This is a wonderful description of flora and fauna, and also descriptive of what we have lost; well done, Kim.
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Thank you so much, Francis!
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How lovely to contemplate this symbiosis……boars and bluebells! I love it!
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I’m delighted you like it, Sherry, It was a choice between boar, beaver and wild pony!
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Love the pictures
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Thank you for reading and commenting.
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You are welcome
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I like the transition of mud and wild boars to delicate blue bells. Nature is indeed incredible.
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I like the transition of mud and wild boars to delicate blue bells. Nature is indeed incredible.
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Thank you, Suzanne. In France, the wild boar exist side by side with bluebells, while we have only bluebells. I would love to see the world as it was before human beings changed it.
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Not sure I want to meet a wild boar though 😀 we have feral ones in northern Australia. They sound terrifying!
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Such a rich landscape of the senses. (K)
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Thank you, Kerfe.
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I came away with such a sense of aliveness, and lightness, the stirrings of life.
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Thank you, Paul.
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Most welcome Kim.
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Lovely cycling. To think from far time to the present through life cycles is green mind for sure …
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Cheers, Brendan. Apparently, pigs are being reintroduced to forest as part of rewilding, but they are sadly not wild boar. I wonder if domestic pigs eventually become wild boar.
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I think I’d be scared of the boar, though I might delight in the bluebells if I didn’t know the area’s flora and fauna losses. I wonder what man or bird or boar brought them there and why. I enjoyed the compression of time and living changes/images in this poem. It delivers a punch!
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Thank you, Susan! In France, the boar and bluebells exist side by side, together with a wide variety of wildflowers. As part of rewilding, pigs have been set loose in a forest in England, and it’s made a huge difference.
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