a piece of string
This is Arthur Stace at work on a Sydney footpath, his copperplate script of the word Eternity had appeared regularly on the city streets from 1932 to 1966. Stace acted as if both the word and the concept were a depthless mystery he wished to share with anyone who stepped over his work. I did more than once.
How could something be forever? Time and life are explicit. They end.
They say.
A man is walking down the path to the beach, a grandson at his side, the kid’s a chatterbox, what’s that tree? What’s that flower? Are there big snakes in the bush? What does being dead mean? What happens after?
We come to the end of the path and onto the beach where a strong easterly is lumping up what was a good swell earlier in the day. That’s why I’ve got him in tow, if I can’t surf he’s mine for as long as we want.
‘Grandad,’ he says, ‘if I was to cut a piece of string in half forever would there be any left at the end?
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