The Blasted Willow
by Theodora Goss

Several years ago,
the willow by the pond
of the Hall’s Pond Nature Preserve
was struck by lightning.

It split in two, one half
fallen into the water, the other
still standing, its trunk
hollowed out, as though a giant
had scraped out its marrow
for some giant’s banquet
(giants usually being vegetarian,
despite what Jack said). The tree
was probably, I thought,
going to die. It looked so completely
destroyed by a blast that had come
from the sky, as though the gods
were angry with it. What had it done,
what could a willow tree do
to anger the gods, I wondered.
The park maintenance crew
took away its fallen branches.

The following spring,
new branches, fresh and pliant,
began sprouting from what was left
of the trunk. Leaves grew,
the green-on-top, silver-on-the-bottom
leaves of a willow tree,
straight out of Greek myth,
and because the tree
had been blasted, they grew
not up, but out over the water,
as though the dryad of the tree,
learning a lesson from Narcissus,
wanted to look at herself.

In autumn, her leaves fell
on the pond. In spring, her branches
were taller. Three years later,
as I sit beside her, companionably
listening to the buzz of insects
and the distant shout
of volleyball players, she is half
her original height, but still crooked,
still growing hunched over
from her injured trunk,
like an old woman
or a metaphor for resilience.
Some of her branches reach up
toward the sky, defying
whatever forces blasted her
in the first place.
Some of them reach down
to touch the water, as though
she is drinking. She has become
the most beautiful willow tree
at the pond, and the one
I like to sit beside. Teach me,
I tell her, about resilience,
about defying the gods
or giants, about being green
and silver and beautiful,
and not hiding your scars
even after you have been struck
to the heart.

(The image is Water-Lily Pond and Weeping Willow by Claude Monet.)