Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Ashes, Concrete, Dust

Last year, as I left work to go to Ash Wednesday service, I stopped to enjoy the sunset, which seemed a fitting beginning to Ash Wednesday service:



But then I noticed the crane being framed by the window of the parking garage and backlit by the sunset. 




Later, I captured this shot, which shows the glittering towers of Ft. Lauderdale in the background, a parking garage in the foreground:



I tend to think of Ash Wednesday metaphors in terms of what is decomposing:  stars, bodies, all sorts of biological matter.  But decomposing takes many forms.  The ever encroaching march of concrete strikes me as an apt metaphor for Ash Wednesday too:



The concrete covers what we once knew as a familiar landscape.  The cranes hoist new forms into place.  It's a graveyard, of sorts.  We will all be in that graveyard soon enough.



That's why we smear ashes on our foreheads.  Let us remember our mortality and let us not waste a single day.

2 comments:

Lewis Clark said...

Amazing! all the pictures are incredible but i love the last one just a little too much! the ashes on you forehead is a great idea. so passionate and lively. i would share this with my friends.

International conference said...

Building and towers are adding to the pollution because we are cutting trees now to make a space for buildings. Though it looks good but we are destroying our lives and beauty of fresh nature. Level of oxygen is decresing in cities because of concrete and lesser trees. This sea view was so attractive and the sunset looks amazing.