The view from Temple Mound

It’s not hard for me to imagine the thriving community that was once spread out in the plain below Temple Mound. Now tourists walk among the ghosts on the trails that lead from mound to mound. From the flat top of Temple Mound, I could see children climbing up the mound in the distance, their parents taking photos of the young “mountaineers” when they summited. I wondered if they realized, that below their feet, lay the bones of a population long forgotten. Or did they just see a hill that was strangely placed in the middle of a field?