WILLOW WEEP FOR ME...
The river still flowed forever onward, it’s strength lessened because of a new channel created by human hands. In the shallows, tadpoles played waiting for their tails to recede and their legs to form. While on the muddy bank full of marsh reeds, their parents called to one another as the sun began to set. Fireflies flitted from fern to fern while the bees settled into a hollow log that held their hive for the night. On a hill watching, sat one lone Weeping Willow, with tears falling from its leaves. Somehow it knew that soon the water would no longer feed its roots and it would die like so many others that had lived their life along that river. For, unlike man, memories as old as time itself lingered in the sap of every tree that stood.
In the beginning, they had been happy to share, giving shelter with the weathered wood that had fallen during a passing storm or had died a natural death. Even the earth itself fed these children, so new to a world that had existed long before they emerged. And now; now they could feel the world shifting, shattering the rain forests, while taking away the animals that fed them with their scat. Somewhere a Polar Bear screamed for its cub as its baby floated away on a block of ice. And even here in the delta, they could hear that forlorn cry, carried through the ground just above the earth’s crust.
Somewhere far away, fire roared as it consumed the dry hills to the west. Vast amounts of land had been laid bare, with the roots that had held those hills in place pulled out by machines, while behind were others that put down tons of concrete in their place. Even further to the west, an ocean pulled all the garbage tossed there into one huge swirling area, trying to save itself while knowing that coral beds which sheltered a million fish had finally died a silent death.
While man bickered about oil and the rights to it, and who’s faith was the correct faith, only a few noticed the dying. Some stopped to listen, while most laughed at the idea. After all, man ruled this world now so many said, never seeing their own arrogance and believing it was their right to do as they pleased.
Even the earth wept, for it had been placed in just the right spot…a sweet spot in which the sun warmed it but never scorched the ground, the moon created the seasons so that seeds could grow and the ice packs would stay firm; full with fresh water. And it wished that man would only realize that God had created this world for all; from the grass on the plains to the highest mountain, each one was a gift. God was God, no matter what name he had been given over the eons that had passed. When would they finally realize that the human ego had changed his words, and had hidden or abolished some of those words because they needed them to fit what they wanted others to believe as time moved on?
And the Weeping Willow sighed, wishing that its tears would not be shed in vain; that man would give up this need to own and acquire new territories…and finally understand that they are in fact one. One people who each share a common ancestry from long, long ago; just as the trees of the forest, the mountains, and the plains share their own.
