ACE Bogs exhibition - Sarah Smout

Bog Breathing is an exploratory, creative response to experiencing Denton Moor alongside groups of people; leading writing workshops, taking sound recordings of the mosses and water on site, and learning about the site’s restoration and potential future through Yorkshire Peat Partnership’s work and data collection. As the soundscape and poem unfolded, it became integral to tell a story of reciprocity with the land; one which invited people to be part of the future of this moor.

The cello and voice were improvised and recorded in the colloquially named “bog bothy” over two days. I had planned for this to inspire a composition, but whilst there I was captivated by the way nature made its way in. The wind howling down the chimney in the last piece informed the key of the vocal improvisation. The hike up to the bothy with cello and recording gear, and looking out at the expansive views in solitude informed the mood of the music. An empty shell, the space was so resonant that it gave a freedom to my playing.

Babbling pops of sphagnum moss and trickling streams interweave with the improvisations. They were captured via a contact microphone which was probed into hummocks across the site. This perspective of the plant world was a new discovery for me, and I think the sounds captured offer a sense of activity, and comfort. This way of recording gave me the lesson that nature is as much a composer as anyone, with lots to say. What do you feel when you listen to them?

Denton Moor is a patchwork of human and more-than-human stories, timescales, and potential. I wanted the work to reflect this place where lots of different voices intersect.  The italic sections in the poem are a collection of data entries relating to the measurement of key indicators on the moor, and quotes from poets, community groups and school children who spent time on site with me. The artistic design of the poem is inspired by data visualisations illustrating fluctuations in the site’s water table.

Much like the landscape on the cusp of recovery, this soundscape is not a fully sculpted piece with a visible end point. It was breathed into existence collectively, gently nudged into being by the place and time we found ourselves in.

They tell me you are breathing

they measure your time

in centuries of raindrops

Dipwell

average_water_table_depth_cm

-18.88

your canopy of chandeliers

glows green, red and purple

aurora underfoot

100 - Heather ‘Ling’ / Calluna vulgaris

8 – Lustrous bog moss / Sphagnum subnitens

4 – Red bog-moss / Sphagnum capillifolium

and where are your lungs?

Why is it good?

The dark matter that logged

all that touched your open heart

tattooed on your body like patchwork art

written into grains of memory

that live on underneath

What does it do?

High Badger Gate – 50+cm – blanket bog

underneath these moments

that fleet between us

It’s like a treasure trail

You are slipping down

through the fingers of this hill

through the grip of past intentions

swimming now in rivers

amethyst

emerald

gold

precious enough

Denton Moor plot 2 transect

 max_water _table_depth_cm

 -2

Denton moor

   - ‘from the town in the valley’

a group of young collectors

inscribing bog-words to mind

imprints of a place

a few hours’ listening

They tell me you are breathing

scarred and weak

memories leaked back to the sky

millions of sunlit years

black

bare

burnt

You are exposed

and you expose us

holding our fire and our spade

far deeper than bone

Lippersley Pike – Heath – 0-14cm peat depth

But you’re doing good things, too.

What do you see?

sitting in the rushes

a poet maps in pencil

the markings left

on body and soul

on land and soil

They tell me you are breathing

sphagnum, cotton grass, star moss

grasp onto water

Vegetation plot 2x2m

 Eriophorum angustifolium – common cotton grass

quadrat_cover_percent - 4

You are a

constellation

forest

glacier

We all need oxygen

They come here

they tend to your wounds

they build up time

centimetres of star-soaked soil

so you can be young once again

We won’t see it fully recovered in our lifetime

Years may pass

the blink of an eye

a full breath

Notes: “Bog breathing” also known as 'peatland surface motion' monitors movement of the ground's surface by Satellite Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR)