Aeration Chamber, Residue of Service

I came back to this buried aeration chamber four times before the light cooperated — a single inspection hatch left open, throwing one hard rectangle of noon onto the far wall where decades of dissolved minerals have built up a pale, almost geological crust. The concrete itself has started to read like sedimentary rock, the aggregate exposed wherever the alkaline water has slowly eaten the surface paste. This is what patient utility looks like when it finally stops being useful.