11.50 To Manchester Piccadilly

And one day you see that it has always been the same, it has always been you and at the same time not you, not anyone at all. All those memories - the weeping ash tree, the summer evening light through the orange blind, the constant vague unease inside this body of yours. No mystery after all, just something unfolding always on the same screen, all so precious and so provisional, the blue tractor beside the tall pylon, the April sunlight after pounding rain, the young man with a golden Chinese character swinging forward on the chain around his neck as he leans towards his iPad, and you remember notre dame de Rocamadour, the Black Madonna, how many steps you climbed up the cliff side to see her shining face in the darkened church, how you longed for the small coin-like medallion to wear around your neck, watched it drift with you in the waters of the Dordogne. Where is it now?