Autumn. November, 2017
Chailey Common, East Sussex
Turn away from the grass path. Push along the narrow track that leads through the thick folds of red bracken, glowing in the autumn sun. The fallen bracken springs and crunches underfoot. Its high banks narrow, scraping and pulling at clothes as you pass through.
The bracken is heaped in piles
Like a carefully folded blanket
Knitted in thick, burnt orange wool.
Ahead, at the top of the track, a single young oak tree stands adrift from the mainland of the forest. The sharp tap and scratch of a stonechat carries across the common. On the path, seen before succumbing to a heavy tread, a white-lipped snail feels its way across the fallen leaves. A thin black stripe runs along its head and back, neatly spiralling around the shell as though picked out by a coach painter.
Two trees stand above the bracken
Rising toward each other in a perfect arc.
They embrace, attempting to
Hold each other against the wind.
At the edge of the forest the slender silver birch trees wave in the breeze, filling the sky with falling leaves. As they fall, the leaves crunch and crack against bark and branch. The last leaves of the stripped trees dot the bare branches like stepping-stones.
An oak guards the edge of the path, its leaves the last to turn. Still a deep green at the centre, each leaf curls at the edges as it is slowly toasted brown.
The crunch of bracken gives way to the squelch and slide of leaf mulch as the path enters the woods. The forest floor is littered with the spoils of autumn. Acorns and feathers dot the leaves that lie ready to be pulled below by the waiting earthworms. The yellow and orange caps of the sulphur tuft toadstool burst from the carpet of green moss. They climb along one side like balconies on a high-rise block.
Strands, twists and plaits,
Traveller’s joy tumbles from a tree.
Falling upwards in dry tangles
A small bridge leads over a dry streambed and back to the edge of the forest.
The wind is rushing through the bracken.
It tugs and catches on the ragged edges
Pushing them along like waves of flame,
Spreading across the common.
The bracken changes tone and shape as you pass through. First
appearing deep orange, shooting straight into the air. It catches the
sunlight, illuminating the stained glass fronds. Then, dull brown, dry
and brittle, spread out like the bones of a spine. Now, curling around,
reaching back toward the stem like a water bear searching for food.
Ducking, pushing through the last of the bracken you emerge at the top of the hill. A sudden burst of colour almost hurts the eyes. The grass of the common seeming overwhelmingly green after the autumnal browns of the forest. The bright yellow flowers of the gorse bush glow, dazzling in the late afternoon sun.
Overhead a buzzard circles,
Wheeling and turning,
Mewing to the wind.