The Gate of Welcome

Before there were names,
there was a road.

Before there were banners,
there was the turning
toward another life.

The river remembers
what every traveller forgets:
that every home
was once a horizon.

The gate stands quietly,
holding open
a space between departure
and arrival.

Its welcome
asks nothing to be surrendered,
only that we enter
with enough room
to receive one another.

The river keeps its promise,
and the city waits,
not for strangers,
but for neighbours
who have not yet met.

The Gate of Welcome imagines a nation as a threshold. The flag unfolds into river, road, and landscape, carrying the eye toward an arch that shelters a distant city. The composition lingers with the quiet conditions that allow strangers to become neighbours and shared purpose to emerge through encounter.

The gate is an invitation more than an entrance. It gathers together memory, aspiration, and the hope that every journey may find a place to rest. The painting suggests that belonging is continually renewed, not through possession, but through the patient work of receiving one another. Like a river, welcome is never finished. It is something that keeps flowing.