liquid ground

Author's name: Rafaela Edelbauer

In the daylight, I finally noticed what I hadn't been able to see in the dusk of the previous day: from the edges, the entire market had dropped by a meter in an oval shape, finally reaching its lowest point concavely toward the center. And there was still the worst: beyond the city wall, one could see the church tower, swaying dangerously to the right. The hole, I thought in a state of excitement. The mosaic, which I could now see, was nevertheless still intact. It was quickly understood that danger lurks no one through stillness, because here a process has been going on for decades. But the same caution that prevented someone from walking confidently across the glass bridge was the same one that violently pushed me away from this hole. I didn't want to cross this thing; I felt disgusted—it seemed that something underground had pulled it down with its earthy lips, which rubbed and squeezed the heart of the houses with its sphincter muscle. In fact, no one among the passersby walked through the middle of this place; everyone took the path on the edge, driven by their natural instinct.