“Time is moss-green, damp. It lies on branches, serpentine. It sways to some breath we can’t feel, a noiseless call; and sheds its skin to show a newer green."
In the Rain Forest - Beth Singer Bentley
From top: Painted trillium (Trillium undulatum), a sylphlike spirit of old mossy woods; running clubmoss (Lycopodium clavatum) and young ferns lay seige to a rotting stump; wild sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis), often mistaken for ginseng, with clusters of ball-like white flowers; a mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum), whose distinctive, palmately-lobed leaves shield a single white flower; heartleaf foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia), a lover of moist forest coves and seeps; the pendulous yellow flowers and graceful, arching stems of smooth Solomon's seal (Polygonatum biflorum); the gaudy, pouch-like flowers of the pink lady's slipper orchid (Cypripedium acaule), which function as highly effective bee lures for pollination (note that one of the flowers in the lower photo is pure white, a rare genetic mutation); and a young red eft (Notophthalmus viridescens) starts its perilous journey to adulthood.