Story Series: Battle for Water
The time is now for change. My story series is about identifying as a collective beyond ego.
Everything here is water. Blue on blue on blue. Water is life, and everybody needs it, so there’s always a fight over it. Who owns it, who gets it, who gets cut off.
Up top on the right is the black ship. I’m always putting in these ships. This one moves in heavy, windows lit, coming to take. Underneath it the drops fall in rows. Rain, or water being pulled away. Both.
Down below, the people are climbing. Ladders run all through it. Everybody reaching for what they need. Over on the right the flowers bloom anyway, pink, right in the middle of the battle. And in the center, one arrow points up.
What the Painting is Seeing
The battle is real, and it is accelerating.
Researchers documented 420 water-related conflicts worldwide in 2024, a record that far surpassed the 355 of 2023; the violence more than quadrupled in five years. In 2000, only 24 such incidents were reported. The Pacific Institute sorts them three ways: water as a trigger of violence, water systems as targets, and water as a casualty, as when shell fragments hit a tank. Violent conflict over water hit a record last year +2
The ships in Kurt’s sky have counterparts. In 2025, water stations were hit by drone strikes from the Rapid Support Forces, Sudan’s paramilitary. Attacks on civilian water systems accelerated through 2024 and into 2025 in the Ukraine war. pacinstpacinst
Rivers have become leverage. India placed the Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance in April 2025, a day after the Pahalgam attack killed 26 people, and the move suspended data sharing and dispute resolution between the two nuclear-armed neighbors. In July 2026 India restated the freeze, amid a heatwave in Pakistan. Pakistan Seeks Canada's Backing For Indus Waters Treaty Restoration After India's Suspension | VIDEO +2
Cities are reaching the bottom of the cup. Tehran’s 15 million residents are counting toward “day zero,” with groundwater around the city falling by 101 million cubic metres a year, water accumulated over decades of rain. Iran’s president warned that without rain, the capital may one day have to be evacuated. mansfield103iranintl
And at home: the seven Colorado River states could not reach consensus, so in August Interior imposed new rules that cut Lower Basin deliveries by 1.25 million acre-feet a year for two years, on a river that supplies drinking water to 40 million people. nationalaglawcenter.org +2
The wide frame came in January. A UN University report declared an era of “global water bankruptcy,” where rivers, lakes, and aquifers deplete faster than nature can refill them. Nearly three-quarters of humanity lives in countries classified as water-insecure. The UN names water bankruptcy as a driver of fragility, displacement, and conflict. un report declares global state water bankruptcy +2
The Codes
The vocabulary from the Code Collection is all here, observed in the hand.
The ground. Cerulean holds the field, sitting between Throat and Third Eye on the seven grounds. Seeing and saying. A painting that asks to be spoken.
The vertical. Ladders rise through the center and right, rungs counted, running toward the top edge.
The count and containment. Under the black ship, the drops fall ruled into rows. Inside the ship, a row of windows held within a boundary.
The accent. Pink carries the choice: the flowers on the right, the arrow at center. Life, and direction.
The surviving word. Near the top, one word holds whole: earth. The eye lands there. The rest of the field arranges itself around it.
The Teaching
Water yields, and water wins. It finds the low places and wears down stone. The Tao Te Ching says nothing is softer than water, and nothing surpasses it against the hard.
The world is learning this the expensive way. Every treaty frozen, every station struck, every aquifer drained is a lesson in relationship. Upstream and downstream are one river. Kurt paints it as a battle because that is how it currently looks. The flowers bloom because that is how it actually works.
Be like water. Stay soft. Stay moving. Know where you come from: the word left whole is earth.
Sources:
- Pacific Institute: surge in water-related violence
- Water Conflict Chronology 2025 fact sheet
- Violent conflict over water hit a record (AP via AOL)
- Arab News: Pakistan urges UN on Indus treaty
- Free Press Journal: Indus treaty in abeyance
- Anantam IAS: India’s July 2026 restatement
- Sky News via Mansfield 103: Tehran day zero
- Iran International: Cape Town model for Tehran
- Smart Water Magazine: new Colorado River rules
- National Ag Law Center: Reclamation final EIS
- Source NM: Colorado River states meet in DC
- Al-Monitor/AFP: global water bankruptcy
- Mail & Guardian: UN water bankruptcy report