This work is a deeply personal reflection on love, separation, and the quiet weight of war. My sister and I share the same blood and resemble each other, yet we live on different continents, separated not only by distance, but by forces beyond our control. This is my self-portrait — not just of my face, but of a state of being: two women lying still, powerless before circumstance.

The stones beneath us symbolize the countless days since the war began — heavy, silent, accumulating. The title refers to a verse from the Bible, in the Book of Ecclesiastes (3:5): “A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together.” Now is the time to gather — to bring order, to restore what was scattered, and to face the emotional consequences of disconnection and grief.