Vesna McMaster – Wind

Wind up the tomato, we have 20 minutes. What will you say, in your allotted time? Tick tick tick tick.

Equivalencies of time to money, ‘spending’ time, ‘wasting’ time, apparently were not always made. I hear the concept was accentuated with the rise of Calvinist ethics of work equating to goodness – and the obverse of leisure equating to sin. Hard to imagine a ‘time’ where time is not measured. The carriage clock came around in the 1700s, bringing the blissfully diverse chronological inconsistencies of diverse forms into jarring collisions. Look, we have put Time into a box and it can even withstand the jolts of rutted mud baked hard in the sun, a bad-tempered coachman and a fly-stung horse. Time has come from Exeter to York, and somewhere along the way you and I are a full forty minutes away from each other, even while I see you right in front of me.

No no, I must not digress. The time will not come back and then what will I have to show for my industry? Wind back the tomato. Tick tick tick tick is faster. Tick tick tick.

Wind back the time, take back mistakes. Slide the progress bar back of the video of existence. Watch the exploded fragments rush together from the corners of the room, the ashes reconstituted themselves into walls, to trees, to flesh. Watch how cleverly they jump into place, creating calm from chaos. Tick tick tick tick.

Wind up the sleepy eye of care, forget imperatives of time. Death, in her leisure, graciously hosts a tea, her guests eternity. Tick tick tick tick tock.