Shooting Flowers

He comes to the forest and shoots the trees when he is angry. The rocks penetrate our trunks and leave scars for decades, but he never knows the real damage.

It happens when he leaves, when he returns to the village. Night steals over the forest as soon as the sun sinks behind the mountain, and we look down at our trunks. Stars fall from the sky in grief. The creek murmurs in the distance. We feel the destruction in our hearts and look to the sky. Maybe if the moon is there, she can heal us.

But she is not there today. She cannot help us, and it seems as though the man who lives there will not help us either, but we cry out to him anyway. He is our only hope.

The wind takes up out sighings and lifts them to the sky. He gathers our tears and carries them through time and space, and as he does so, they turn to mist and fall to the earth. The earth drinks in our tears and creates a masterpiece.

Deep beneath the soil I feel the gift forming. Moles busy themselves in their holes, adding a spec of gold dust here, a mint leaf there, and they bring it to the surface. The dryads come out of their homes and listen to the work. The elf comes down from the mountain on her reindeer, and even the prince and his princess come down from the clouds to see the fruit of our tears.

As the night wears on, a trumpet echoes through the canyon and the hills. The sound travels out from the source and I know even the trees on the other side of the earth hear it. We shiver in anticipation.

The man steps down from the moon when he hears our cries. He comes with only himself and walks among the forest. He sees the damage and he calls the moles. They form a line through the woods along the unseen paths and wait to meet the man in the moon. 

A nervous young mole waits in line with his gift. He watched his father work and tried to replicate the process, but somehow, the emerald and ruby dust he poured into the mixture turned the whole thing into a crumbly mess. As he stood in line, he tried to keep from damaging the seed anymore, but his hands shook against his will.

He finally arrives at the front of the line and holds out his paws without making eye contact. Hands engulf his paws and close them around the seed. He watches, and when the man opens his paws, the seed is perfectly formed and coated with gold.

The man in the moon smiles before the mole takes his new seed to the nearest tree. He climbs up to where the rock landed, and puts the seed there in the hole.

And then he vanishes back into the ground.

The sun rises from the sea and sees no sign of the work from the night before. She looks down on the earth and gives us the life she was made to provide, but she doesn’t notice the change.

But the villagers notice. A few of them are observant enough to see that something has changed. Instead of the scars of yesterday, flowers grow from our trunks. Mossy cascades pour down—sapphire and amethyst and opal flowers shine out from among the leaves. They reflect the light from the sun up onto the underside of our leaves until it appears as though we stand over water.

It is as if the boy came with his slingshot, and instead of shooting stones, he shot living flowers into our hearts.