Olena lifts her gaze from the iron looking tense:
“Is it the siren?”
I look around,
I go outside in the courtyard and listen,
construction workers working,
cars honking in the traffic,
everything seems fine.

“No” I answer “I don’t think so”.

Olena slightly lets herself go
with teary eyes:
“I think I am going crazy, I hardly sleep, my life has been hard in the past, but I never imagined I would live a situation like this.”

“By now, when I hear the siren I sit down and pray, this is what is needed, pray for healing from the disease of power and money, which has infected the mind of the person who started it all.”

“Yesterday, 80 missiles were launched toward L’viv and 6 of them hit some parts of the city, while the rest has been intercepted by the air defense systems.”
“I have a cousin who has been living with his family in a basement in the suburbs of Kiev for a month with no electricity. He cannot go out and take the car to flee because if he does so he would be shot. If we can get him and his family here, can you help me send them to Italy?”

Her gaze deepens, her eyes thoughtful:
"How long will it take us to recover from all this hatred, do you realize?"
I realize that I feel like remaining silent,
a full silence,
of the one who welcomes the person in front of him, her suffering.

I would only like to convey:
“I am here,
and it is all I can give you right now,
beyond the language barrier,
beyond the fact that we come from different countries”.

We are human beings that met each other
in a city where sirens go off day and night,
and you get up in the morning feeling that your body is sending you signals.

I ask to take a picture together,
to Olena,
and to the other cooks in the parish house.
She immediately gives me an embarrassed look:
“But how.. I look terrible”,
I smile:
“Don’t worry”.
We laugh.

We stand in the kitchen,
and my smartphone takes the picture.
Sunbeams shine through the outside,
we savour this moment of warmth and friendship
as if we were in a normal situation,
as if it were just one of the first Spring days.