Ficinia nodosa Through gale and rain you grow your lean reeds like a thicket of masts that bend, ever-so-slightly to the east—sun-obeisance or simply the wind blasting from the west, hurtling through this bowl of muddy water and its lining of meandering reeds? In these quantities you form a field, shaggy as the hide of an unkempt dog. Alive, electric. When the creek runs its cold tongue over sand and mud, and tannin water rises over crabholes, you grow greener, thicker, more vigorous as if realising the gift you offer: here in this corner between swamp and creek, a swan…