The Source
A few more days in the valley — and the water at the edge of the town.
Verkhovyna was going to be a few days. I meant to move on — back to where the sound of the cowbell carries down off the high pasture.
This morning will turn into a few more mornings, a few more days.
Helping where the help is wanted. The host teaches; we sit and talk the work through — what it could be here, where it might go. Nothing settled.
At the edge of the town the water comes straight out of the mountain. My host and I walked up to the source, bottles in hand. Water for the next day or two.
The bells come down from the polonyna — the high summer pasture, the herd up there for the season, a fire kept the whole time and not let to die.
The name means the high country. This is where the water starts.
Midsummer here is old. Fire on the tops, wreaths set on the water — Kupala, the season I came in on.
This is not just a town.
And the question that keeps returning: what becomes of a place like this, once the country is inside the Union?
Day 10 — Räumen — Soil and Peace
Verkhovyna, Carpathian Mountains, Ukraine
© 2026 Michel Garand | Soil and Peace | CC BY-SA 4.0
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