Monday, December 30, 2013

Notes from the Skeleton Coast: Industrialised past








The oil drill rig is so rusted its steel plates look like lace curtain:  eaten away by salt air and wind-driven sand.

The derrick, collapsed and toppled into the sand.  Nearby, hyena and jackal tracks head away into the desert.  Why did they come here?  Where do they go?

Abandoned diamond mine:  Remains of a jetty or pipeline juts out into the sea.  T-shaped pillars.  Cormorants sit drying their wings.  It pollutes the empty vastness of the desert beach. Yet, slowly, the desert and the sea are breaking it down.  Claiming it.  Sand covers it and rust erodes it.  One day, it may all be covered or broken or gone.  








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