Why the Willow Weeps

Have you ever noticed that there are no trees quite like the Willow? Or wondered why it is called the "Weeping" Willow? Have you noticed that where almost all other trees reach high toward the sky, the Willow's branches reach instead toward the ground? Have you ever lay beneath a Willow's boughs and listened to her soft sighs and heard the sound of her weeping? Listen, now, and I will tell you a story about why this is...

A long, long time ago, before there were people like you and me, Magickal creatures had dominion over this world we now call home. Some of these creatures were called Dryads; they were the beautiful Daughters of the Goddess who tended to the trees of Her vast forests. Ordinarily, a Dryad lived her life in search of a single, perfect tree with which to marry her life force. It was was a very special, very personal process for each Dryad; it was a Song in her blood that began at her first flowering, then grew stronger and stronger until the day she found the tree that perfectly mirrored her soul. In that glorious moment, the Dryad bound her life force to the tree's and the two became one for all time.

Willow was not like her sisters. Whereas they spent their days hearing the Song of their special tree somewhere out in the Mother's forest, Willow heard nothing. She loved the forest and every tree in it, but she felt no desire to bind with any of them, not even a tingle. She was saddened by her lack of desire and often wondered what was wrong with her. She often wandered the forest wondering why she couldn't hear the Song.

Late one afternoon, Willow's heart was particularly heavy. Two of her sisters had found their trees and a celebration was underway. As much as she wanted to share in her sisters' joy, their triumph only emphasized Willow's continued failure, her difference.

She wandered through the forest until she came across a marshy glen that she'd never been in. A wide, lazy stream flowed through it, burbling happily in the late afternoon sunlight. The marshy ground felt good as it crept up around her ankles wherever she stepped. She sat among the reeds on the stream's bank and let her heavy heart spill out. She wept for her loneliness, for her feelings of isolation. Even among her sisters, she did not feel any sense of belonging. They knew their place -- she didn't.

"Why does such a beautiful girl cry so?" spoke a warm voice.

Willow looked up to find an old Satyr standing nearby, leaning heavily on an old thornwood staff and regarding her with warm amber eyes. He was very old -- there was white and iron grey shot through what was once the rich brown wool of his goatish legs, and his horns curled clear around his head, like a ram's.

"I'm crying because I'm alone," wept Willow. "I am alone and I have no Song to follow, no tree to bind myself to."

"Ah." The Satyr nodded sagely. He sat down beside her, groaning softly as his old bones creaked. "Alone, you say?" he asked once he was comfortably seated next to her. He shook his head. "Not in this forest, you're not."

The Satyr stretched his arms wide, gesturing to the world all around them. "There is life all around us, always." He continued. "The Lady of the Woods -- your Mother, that is -- sees to it that you're never alone."

"But my tree --" Willow began.

"Nonsense." The Satyr snorted. "I know all about the Song, lass. But who says you have to bind yourself to a tree? Your Mother certainly doesn't. No," he held up a gnarled hand to forestall Willow's response. "I know it's the way it's always been done, and all your sisters are giddy with excitement over it. It's probably all they talk about, isn't it?"

Willow nodded.

"I thought so. But tell me: if the Thunderbird began hurling lightning bolts and all your sisters decided they all just had to catch them, would that mean you had to as well? I didn't think so.

"I came here today to die; I am very old and today is my day. I wanted to die on the bank of my favourite stream. I've made many wonderful memories here. In my time, I've chased and bedded more pretty lasses than I can count. I've probably sired more children in this glen than there are trees in the whole forest." His salacious wink shocked Willow into a giggle.

"But never in all that time did I feel the need to bind myself to any one of them. If I had felt it, believe me when I say I would have done so.

"There's nothing wrong with what your sisters feel or what they want. But if you don't feel what they feel, there's nothing wrong with that, either. I've had the privilege of living a long life and seeing more than most -- take it from an old Satyr, lass: there's nothing wrong with being what you are, whatever that may be."

Willow looked away, turning his words over in her mind. They rang true in her heart, but...

"Is it really that easy?" she wondered aloud. She was unsure that such an easy answer could possibly be true.

"Of course it is." the Satyr replied. "The problem with the young is that you think every problem has to have a big, dramatic answer. Usually, a small, simple one is all you need."

Willow smiled. For the first time, she didn't feel alone or sad that she didn't hear the Song the way her sisters did.

Seeing her smile, the Satyr nodded and gave her a smile of his own. "Good," he said. He reached out and plucked up some reeds from the bank. His fingers were old and gnarled but they still knew their Craft -- in no time he fashioned a set of Panpipes. "Now, if you'll grant a dying Satyr his final wish, I'd like to die with my head in the lap of a beautiful girl."

Willow gladly let the old Satyr rest his aged head in her lap. She lovingly stroked his wooly head while he lifted his pipes to his mouth and brought forth music. He played her a song, the notes taking wing in the marshy glen and flying into the deepening sky. It was a song of happiness, of cheer. The notes mingled with the burbling stream, the chirping of a distant cricket, and the humming of nearby insects. It was a Song made to lift the soul, and with it the old Satyr lifted the last traces of Willow's sadness.

The tears came again, and she wept them; but not tears of sadness, these, but tears of joy. Her new friend put his last breath into his pipes and was gone, his spirit mingling with the music and rising to the skies. As the last notes of his song passed into silence, the light of day finally faded into night. The full moon shone brightly.

From a shaft of silver moonlight stepped the Goddess. With infinite love She caressed Her Daughter's long tresses.

"My Daughter," She said in voice as gentle as nightfall, "You do not need a tree to bind yourself to, for you can be your own tree."

There, on the bank of the stream where an old Satyr had played his final song for a new friend, the Goddess turned Her Daughter into the first Weeping Willow. She laid the Satyr's body to rest among Her Daughter's roots, then She blessed the reeds that grew on the bank so that those who knew the Craft of Making might fashion their own Panpipes to make such music in the future...

That is why there are no trees quite like the Weeping Willow and why, if you lay beneath one you can still hear her soft weeping as she cradles your head in her lap, her long tresses brushing your face. Not tears of sadness, these, but tears of happiness: for she knows that she is not alone in the world, and she can tell you -- if you have learned to listen -- that you are not alone in the world, either, and there is nothing wrong with you for not feeling as those around you feel. Be different. Be blessed. Be you.

Blessed Be!