As I venture towards the void, I notice the footprints in the sand, the ripples and hills mirroring sound waves, the plant life stretching outwards.
The years of history encoded in the tree’s, the stories told by the leaves littered along the path.
The etchings in stone and rust wearing away at metal.
Nature overgrowing temples and monuments, roots finding their way into soil.
Handprints scattered, imperfect snapshots of past lives captured.
From the smallest scrape reflected by a patch in a pair of jeans
To the most epic tales; the wear and tear of books, folded edges of pages and markings etched throughout them. The windows into the souls of their creators.
Notes embedded in music boxes, the style of a handwritten letter, the words used; a part of you is left behind.
From the most transient creations to the structures which have stood the test of time.
Cultures embedded in imagery and architecture, places of beauty, windows into another time.
We project ourselves onto our environments, and our environments project themselves onto us.
Time wears away at all things, but the ripples of past decisions will live on through the generations, the decisions made, the worlds crafted, the stories told.
What fuzzy version of ourselves, our culture and our histories can be recreated through the artefacts left behind? Which aspects will forever remain as guesswork with a myriad of possible histories? Will we ever perfectly preserve what once was, or will history be contorted, a ghost, like the light seen through a telescope?