Top of the World

All of history in that top. A crucified bag flaps up the context. I am returning to locate something I passed. It feels as though I have gone too far, but it must be here somewhere. I spot the spot. It echoes the orange of that gregarious bag.






It is there. Looking up like the Sun never does. Simply a top. But what does it reveal of its place and people? Of the ones who designed it, created, made, used and finally cast it aside?

A path where many people tread would not have harboured it for long had it been valuable. Well-trodden into the soil yet superlatively visible. Even by an eye in motion. I add myself, for scale.






Now it is the setting Sun. Setting over heroes, empires, and lost horizons. Check the bag again, it could have been carried along in that once upon a time. Too much of a coincidence. But there is no such kind of coincidence. Move in closer.















It's blurred: the mobile phone won't get any closer without terrible distortion and infidelity. Dive in anyway and find nothing but soil behind. Printed soil. Or an upright bottle with a cryptic message scrolled inside.

The message says:

Check the shadows

Across the mud sundial

Time lapsed

53°46'57.75N 1°36'55.13W

Wonders could be worked out with geometry alone! Even Time itself!

Then imagine what it would be like if you photographed and recorded every perfect trodden-in top you ever passed. What history you would be making.









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