Touring around the ravished and restored cities of Germany a visual emblem of hope emerged as we rounded the corner.  Swinging on tree branches were Easter eggs.  Eggs strung on winter dead branches coloured in the primary yellow and blue of the Ukrainian Flag.  It would be easy to write this display as a child’s puzzle — but the painful truth is that the dead bodies of Ukrainian people will not be ressurected, will not celebrate a new beginning, will not leave us alone.  The river meanders along the foundations of houses as a city, a country, pauses to look through the drizzle of time into the present.

There is a stateliness to these once peasant houses towering over the vistas of prime real estate.  The slaughterhouses gone, the offal no longer floating in the river.  Time does strange things to the stages of history.

The stage for a Shakespeare or Hollywood!  This courtyard often stages plays and the historical setting doubles as theatre and residence. The eye is drawn to the valley below.

The bold yellow of the Canola field and the blue grey of the mountains band together to drape the horizon in a flag.  A promise of hope. Hope for a promise.