A darkness of Snowdrops
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve photographed Snowdrops. The annual pilgrimage to one woodland pasture or other to pay homage to these beautiful diamond blooms is something I can’t easily ignore.
However, more and more I became disillusioned with the photos I came back with. Year after year I returned with yet another set of shots that more or less emulated the previous February’s, and the ones before that! So, I chose bad weather for this particular visit and delayed until the flowers were submitting to the onset of age and eventual decay.
Battling through the squalls of Cumbrian rain I slipped my way along the slick mud paths into the dark heart of this secluded wood where once there stood a tiny cottage. The roof of the stone building collapsed decades ago, as did the boundary walls which kept the creep of woodland out of the gardens.
There’s been a great coming together of the untamed and the gardened, orchestrated no doubt by the spirit of the place. The snowdrops have tumbled like spilled crystals out into the oaks and the sycamores, climbing over the limestone rocks and gracing this corner of wild with a new Imbolc robe.
On this day the flowers, heavy with raindrops, bowed submissively to the pressures of winter, or spread their failing petals wide to fume pollen onto their neighbours.
It was dark and dank. Every square inch of moss held a lake of fresh rain, glistening acid green on the slumbering trunks and greying limestone. As I lay on my belly I was breathed in by the place and knew in an instant that it was the light I had to catch. The light and shadow evoked the secret way of the snowdrops for me, showing them as living moving beings that danced to their own rhythm deep in this dark woodland.
