Driving back last week from an installation in MO, I found myself on roads I frequented when Mom was still living and I was collecting photos of weeping willows to illustrate The Secret of Salix Babylonicus. I perked up in anticipation of seeing "Great Salix" again, the willow that graced the cover of the story. But when I saw him, he was down, lying beside the pond he had shaded and drunk from all his days. I remembered the recent storms that had been through the area and could only assume, since he showed no signs of having been cut down or carved up, that his time had come by more natural means or by an "act of God."
What a parable of the times, I thought. No, what a parable of a parable, one that only becomes more relevant and poignant and prophetic with each passing day. And here I was thinking that literary significance, as a rule, tends to wane with time. But no. Not when God's eternal Spirit of wisdom is feeding the roots, and testifying once again that, "unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit."
I managed to stay on the road, swallowed hard, and kept my foot on the gas. No weeping, not yet. Not while the battle still rages, not while the pestilence—of murderous greed—still circles overhead like a cast of vultures. But Great Salix! How the mighty have fallen! May your death give new life to many!
