When living is just a shade

I was going to write about something else today but had to head out to the thick of the disaster zone for work, through the slush of mud that still hasn't dried and through the gauntlet of people's furnishings and belongings, all caked in a hue that makes it look like the colour has been zapped completely from it.

It looks for all the world like people have inverted their homes and placed everything outside. They have. All you see is this:

That scene is repeated ad infinitum in surprisingly neat grids, almost as if the families and the communities are allocated only so much cubic metreage to their heartache. The homes that have had their furniture removed already from the footpath storage have left behind tell-tale outlines in the mud of where it was. Their heartache was here. Please remember, it seems to be saying.

Everything is a dull and muted grey. There is no colour out there.

But it will return, bursting through the cracked mud like the spirits that have kept this city on its feet.

Hope springs eternal.