Many wide steps descend from Prague Castle. About of the third way down is a very small structure. It is closed and locked. It’s window boarded shut. But many years ago it was a tavern. A place where three, maybe four, could sit inside. People would come with small cushions, buy a glass of pilsner and sit on the steps. Some conversing, others in silence looking down to the city below. After awhile you could watch as It’s lites would begin to turn on.

There is a church there where it is hard to tell where marble ends and painting begins. I had studied it for quite some time, but there were still places on the ceiling I could not find the transition.

Walking the streets and back streets of Prague is hard to describe, but they seem to lead you to places you need to go.

Behind the castle is a summerhouse. It stands at the end of a large garden. Sitting on one of its benches in silence you can feel the presents of a small child. Someone who is watched after, but let to play inside the walls. He seemed to be alive inside his innocents and his thoughts were that of wonder. He seemed to climb the trees and run and hide among the flowers and hedges.

There were times he would sit and listen to its sounds. Maybe a bird, maybe a breeze as it gently moved his hair. Maybe he could hear the river below. Maybe people talking as they walked on the other side of the wall. Maybe he wondered who they were, or why he couldn’t be with them.

The world was his to discover, it all seemed so new.

The mind has a way of thinking of things and understanding things that don’t seem to be a part of the things our eyes see. I wonder who the small boy was. I wonder who the small boy in the tree house was. Maybe somewhere in the back streets of towns and cities that are rarely visited come forth these things. Or maybe it is traveling in the darkness of night.

And so it was on the train back to Munich I saw the ghost rider again. He was still on his way to Prague. Still scared. It was as if he was caught in some eternal movement that would not let him free. Or maybe was it that whenever we move or think we leave a trace behind. Like tracks in the snow. Only waiting for us to return.