Not for Children Story Book

The Wayfarer : Where Day Meets Night

Posted on by SomatiCat

A wayfarer came up to a village on his way to another day. The sun was shining brightly in the very middle of the sky. The field was filled with golden waves. Over rolling hills, cattle and sheep were drowsily munching on soft green pastures. Men and women with their nicely tanned skin, working in the fields tending cattle and picking berries, waved at the wayfarer. Waving back, he walked into the village. The day was bright. Smells of freshly baked bread, noise of running hens, stalks of sunflowers welcomed him.

The wayfarer had passed through many villages. Some were starving, some were sick, and some were fighting. To his tired eyes, this village was a paradise.

A man with strong hands came out to welcome him.

“I travel from the past to another day. Your village can be my today. Would you give me permission to stay for a night? Tomorrow I will be heading for another day,” the wayfarer said.

“Please allow me to have you as our guest, and tell us stories of your world of the past,” said the man of the village. They shook hands. The wayfarer saw something strange fly across the face of the welcoming man, but was not quite sure what it was.

There was something strange about the village. Everything was so bright in the mid-day sun high in the center of the sky, and everything looked flat, as if it were cut out of paper. What the wayfarer did not notice was that nobody cast a shadow here. What the man of the village noticed was the wayfarer’s dark shadow on the ground when he reached his hand out.

The man of the village said to the wayfarer, “Our king lives in a castle on the hill. His majesty loves to hear stories of other countries. He will throw a great feast for you.” Then the man took the wayfarer to the great castle on the hill.

The king himself welcomed the wayfarer. He was old but a strong man with deep tan. He used to be a fearless warrior, somebody whispered into the wayfarer’s ear. The feast started with music and dancers. Roasted ducks, eggs, bread and cheese. Wine flowed from pitchers. Noble men and ladies in the castle ate and drank. Even guards were with goblets filled with wine. The wayfarer started to tell his story of the past.

The king said, “My dear royal guest, tell the Prince, my only son, your story.   He has never seen the ocean or the mighty rivers you crossed. He has never known other countries, where other kings, queens, and princesses reside in their castles. He is now in the field riding his favorite horse. He will return soon.”

The Prince was a handsome young man. His hair and his eyes were as dark as a forest at night. And he had a shadow. His shadow was so black against the bright white-washed landscape. It was as if somebody cut out darkness itself and pasted it at his feet. When he moved, the dark shadow moved with him.

“Here comes my son. He is my joy and our hope.” The prince dismounted his horse and reached out his hand to the wayfarer. Only the prince looked real among the paper cut-out people.

The wayfarer told stories of dark night in the woods, the mighty river he crossed, great warlords’ castles, white mountains of ice, a frozen river of winter, the sun setting into the ocean, dark caves where dragons and monsters lived. The prince listened to the story with his dark eyes shining.

The feast went on and on. The jar of wine was never left empty. Plates full of food just appeared on the table one after another. Music filled the court of the old king.

“I traveled over hundreds of thousands of miles. I passed through many villages and kingdoms, and I have never seen such a wonderful feast as yours,” the wayfarer said. “Your kingdom must be blessed and filled with golden light like drips of honey on every single crop.”

For an instant people fell silent. Just the music kept on filling the void.

The prince said, “I do not know if I am blessed or not, since this is the only world I know from the beginning of my life. However, a strange feeling sometimes catches me. I miss something, something I have never known.”

The sun was bright and still in the middle of the sky. The wayfarer could not tell how long he had been drinking and eating. The sun never set, and the night never fell. Suddenly, tiredness overcame him. He fell asleep.

When the wayfarer woke up, he found himself in a blinding darkness. His clothes were wet, but he found it cool and pleasant. He heard water running nearby. His eyes started to see dark shapes of trees. It was night—blissfully dark night.

There was no moon, but he could see. The wayfarer wondered where the mysterious light came from. It was a cool blue-green light, which did not convey warmth. It was not the kind of light that came from a single source. Then he realized that some trees were glowing slightly.

This was the strangest forest he had ever seen.

“They thought you were dead,” a man’s voice came from the forest.

The wayfarer jumped and turned toward the voice. A man stood there in a long dark gray robe.

“I did not mean to scare you. I am a priest and serve the high priestess of our order. An owl told me that they sent a dead man up the river. It’s been a while since the last one.”

“Then, this is the country of the dead, isn’t it?” the wayfarer asked.

“No, you are not dead. And if you do not know where you are now, you must be a stranger.”

The wayfarer explained his journey and the strange village.

“They mistook you for dead and sent you to this side of the river to be buried.   We bury their dead as well as ours in this forest of night. They did not mean harm. We do not mean harm to you. But I must take you to our high priestess. She has never been out of the woods.”

The wayfarer was curious and decided to follow the priest.  Although the priest also seemed to glow slightly, it was not enough to light the way.  The priest noticed his companion’s awkward steps and stopped to break a small branch from a nearby tree.  He handed it to the wayfarer, and then he cupped his hands at the end of the branch.  The slight light started to concentrate.  It was a soft cool light, similar to that of fireflies, with a touch of yellow.  The light breathed in a slow steady rhythm at the end of the stick.

They walked deep into the woods.  The noise of dead leaves and breaking branches under their feet echoed in the darkness.  It was an unusual forest.  The night was as strange as the day on the other side of the river.  “It’s the silence,” the priest murmured.  Anybody who has ever spent a night in woods knows that the woods should be more alive at night.  But here they hear no cricket sing, no frog croak, or no night crawlers howl.  Even leaves of the trees did not rustle.

The trail led them into a clearing, where they found a small spring.  The water was radiating cool sapphire blue light.  The wayfarer was drawn to the spring and he kneeled down on the edge.  He put his hands into the water.  It was cool like dew that touches your feet when you step into a field early in the summer morning.  He scooped up water from the spring.  The water was glowing in his hands.  Every drop of water dripped from his hands back into the spring was glowing.  

“This spring is the sacred place for us,” the priest said.  “Our order has guarded this spring since the beginning of the time.  Please proceed into our temple.”  The wayfarer looked up and found a grotto opening.

He followed the stream of sacred water into the grotto.  The cool blue glow of the stream guided him further into.  The priest followed behind him in silence.  Footsteps echoed softly and the cool moist floor seemed to breathe at the touch of his feet.  When it breathed, it glowed.  

The wayfarer didn’t know how long he walked in the grotto night.  Sometime the path led him up and sometime down.  The underground stream disappeared and appeared again.  

Then the wayfarer stepped into a clearing in the woods.  He found himself where he started.  Besides the blue hue of the sacred spring, standing the high priestess as if the full moon just stepped down from the sky.  

“The owl told me we had a visitor from the other side,” the priestess spoke in a soft voice.  “He came from the place far away,” the priest said.  “I found him by the river.”  The priestess face lit up.  “It has been long time since the last stranger passed by.  Tell me about the place you came from.”  

The wayfarer told the stories of his long journey from the past: a night in the woods, the mighty river he crossed, great warlords’ castles, white mountains of ice, a frozen river of winter, the sun setting into the ocean, dark caves where dragons and monsters lived.  Then he told the story of the strange village of people with no shadows.  When he told about the dark eyes of the prince, the priestess’ blue eyes shined.

The night was soft and permanent.  Nothing moved in the woods.  Then the wayfarer realized the priestess was not there.  And there was no moon in the sky.  The priest came to sit next to him and started to tell the story of the Night and the Day.

“Before our priestess was born, there was a time we had both nights and days.  The villagers were farmers and we were medicine people living in the woods.  We crossed the river to go to the market in the village to exchange our fruits, nuts, mushrooms, herb and medicines for their bread and cheese.  The villagers came to the sacred spring to receive blessing.  Babies, the newly married, the sick, and the dying, every one of the villagers came here sometimes in life to receive blessings.  Some moved in the woods and became one of us.  Others moved out to the village and became one of them.  Our children played together crossing the river back and forth.  

There used to be a flock of birds here, nesting in the woods.  In the morning they flew out to the field and at night they came back to the woods to rest.  One day a king’s man shot at a bird crossing over the river.  One bird fell down to the ground and died, and then it turned into gold.  The man smelt the gold and made a golden goblet.  He poured wine in the goblet and nobody could make the goblet empty.  It just kept on filling itself with heavenly wine.  Then, another man shot another bird down.  It was smelt into a golden plate.  Fruits and berries grew on the plate.  Eventually, no more sick to come to the spring to pray.  Bird by bird, the day got longer.  No more babies to come to bathe in the spring.  Bird by bird, the night got longer.  When the last bird fell from the sky, the day took over the night, and the night the day.  In the king’s court, wine flowed endlessly in the goblet.  Night fell on our woods and never left.   Our people dissipated into the darkness of the night woods.  

Now we can’t step out of the darkness, and they can’t step into the darkness. 

Only one baby was born in the woods after the last bird failed to come home to nest.  Our priestess is the only one who emits light in the woods,” the priest said in a sad voice.

“And only one baby was born in the village after the last bird fell.  The prince is the only one who carries shadow in the day,” the wayfarer said.  “Yes, you are right,” the priest said.  “And we will be separated until the day meets the night…”

Looking at the spring glowing blue, the wayfarer fell asleep.  In his dream, he saw sky full of golden birds flying across the river to the woods.  

When he woke up, it was night.  The priest was nowhere in sight.  He was lying under a tree near the spring, with soft moist ground underneath his body.  He stood up and started to walk back into the woods, toward the riverbank.

Standing on the cool grass at night, he saw the village in the perpetual high noon across the silvery river.  He took a huge breath and dove in the river.  The water wrapped him and embraced him in its arms.  He dove further down and everything seemed to be arrested.  It was quiet as stones.  A moment he thought he saw a school of children —or were they some kind of exotic fish?— swimming further upstream.  

Then he looked upward and shot up into the glaring sun.  It was a fine day on the other side of the river.  A villager saw the wayfarer walk out of the river.  The man ran to the court to tell the king that the dead man crossed the river back.  

The wayfarer went to the court and told the story of the silent night woods and the priestess with silvery hair and sky blue eyes.  The king listened to the wayfarer and gave a big sigh.  

“Nobody but the dead can cross the river between the night and the day.   You are the first one ever who came back from the night. “  

The Prince with dark hair was listening in silence, and then said to the wayfarer, “Take me to the river where you came back to life.”

The wayfarer took the prince to the river.  On the other side of the river, the dark woods were silent.  The prince stood there staring at the woods, with his shadow dark and short on the ground.  

On the other side of the river, the priestess followed footsteps of the wayfarer to the river bank.  The wayfarer saw her standing in the dark shadow of woods, with her silvery hair flowing down to the ground.  

“There she is,” the wayfarer said to the prince.  

“Tell me what you see,” the prince said.

The wayfarer told the prince what she was like, and how she stood there across from the Prince just beyond the reach of the daylight.  

Suddenly, the prince jumped in the river and started swim across.  The river swallowed the prince and he disappeared in the water.  The current was fast and water was cold.  He swam hard and finally reached at the bank.   He came out of the river and found the wayfarer standing in the sun.   

“Tell me what you see,” the prince said.

The wayfarer told him what he saw.

The Prince and the Priestess remained there looking at each other, as if they could see each other.  

The prince jumped in the river and came out of the river in the sun.   The wayfarer told him what he saw. 

The prince jumped in the river and came out of the river again and again. His night-dark hair was wet, reflecting the sun. His dark eyes grew deeper every time he emerged.

The wayfarer noticed that every time the prince came out, his shadow grew a little longer. Each crossing lengthened it.

After one hundred eighty-two times, his shadow became so long that it reached across the river to the other side.

The priestess stepped out of the night woods and walked into his shadow. They finally saw each other for the first time.

The prince stepped into his own shadow toward the priestess. His shadow remained stretched across the river.

They walked toward each other on the bridge of shadow.

In the middle of the bridge, they met.

And there, they dissolved into each other.

They heard thousands of golden birds fly across the river.

Somewhere in the village, a shadow flickered.

Somewhere in the woods, a leaf trembled. 

© J.U. 2007

The image is AI generated.

The One Who Stayed in the Garden

Posted on by SomatiCat

There were three girls, Nana, Kiki, and Zuzu, living together in a small house with a large backyard. Nana was the smart one. Kiki was the pretty one and Zuzu was the dumb one.

Every day Nana went to school with books and pencils and erasers and rulers neatly packed in her backpack. Nana loved to visit the computer room, where she could sit by herself and punch in numbers and formulae. Kiki also went to school, but she didn’t read books. She liked to chat and hang out with friends.

Zuzu always stayed home and played by herself in the large backyard. Zuzu couldn’t read. Zuzu couldn’t write. Zuzu couldn’t talk. She buried things in the backyard, things that had once been alive. She buried things from Mama’s kitchen: carrots, turnips, shells, chicken bones, eggs, fish bones, ox tails, potato peels, grapes, seeds of fruits. She buried things from their living room: goldfish, plants, birds, when they stopped moving. She did not bury Kiki’s socks or her ribbons. She did not bury Nana’s books or papers. So nobody minded what she buried in the backyard. No one asked why she chose the things she did.

In spring many plants broke ground in the backyard. In summer it got crazy. Next to pumpkin vines crawling on the ground, sunflowers stood high above. Papaya and avocado turned the garden into a tropical island and died away when the first autumn wind touched the frail leaves. Baby trees were everywhere. Flowers had no sense of order. You could bump into huge watermelons with cute green stripes. Grasshoppers were jumping around and ants were marching from one place to another. Mama never bought any herbs from the store. She just had to step outside into Zuzu’s garden. Things came back in other forms. And they grew and grew like kudzu in the South. The girls ate watermelons for lunch. Mama baked pumpkin pies. Grape vines crawled up a pine tree. Everything was sweet and rich and nobody cared why. Spiders and caterpillars, which Nana did not like, were everywhere. When something stopped growing, Zuzu buried it in the garden.

One day, Zuzu buried Kiki’s white rabbit fur coat. Zuzu never buried Nana’s stuffed animals. Zuzu never buried Kiki’s dolls. Mama had to tell her not to bury fur coats. But nobody knew if she understood or not.

Nana went to the upper school. Kiki ceased to go to school. All day long Nana wrote and read and calculated. All day long Kiki chatted and chatted. All day long Zuzu stayed in her garden. At night, they ate supper together with Mama.

A peach tree Zuzu had planted long ago became very big. Birds came to the tree and made a nest. Mama bird laid eggs and the eggs became small, tiny baby birds. One day Kiki found a dead baby bird on the ground. There was no storm, no rain, no wicked bird. The baby had just dropped. Zuzu buried the dead bird near the sunflowers as usual.

Grandmother got sick and Mama left to see her. The three girls stayed home by themselves. Kiki got sick and moaned and cried. Nana was worried. Zuzu didn’t say anything. In the morning Kiki had a baby, and it was dead, with blood all over its tiny body. There was no storm, no tornado. Just warm white sunlight shining through the leaves in the garden.

Nana gave the dead baby to Zuzu. She buried it next to the kitten that had died three years ago. Then they forgot about the baby. Zuzu did not forget.

Nana left home to go to college. Kiki left home to be a movie star. Zuzu stayed home with Mama.

Nana earned a lot of degrees and went to work in the big city. She had lots of money in the bank. She invested her money everywhere. She traded bonds and stocks, and bought and sold real estate. Mama did not understand what Nana was talking about, so Nana stopped talking to Mama. Nana got married to a rich man with a boring tie and had three girls. One day she killed them all with a butcher knife. They were buried somewhere. Since Nana was rich and could hire a famous lawyer, they had her sent to a hospital. After a couple of years Nana came back to Mama’s house. She did not read or write anymore. She died without saying a word to anybody. Zuzu buried her in the backyard, next to the kitten.

Kiki earned a lot of admirers and bought jewelry, fur coats, dresses, and cars. She won a trip to Europe. She made a lot of friends there. She went to parties with her jewelry and her admirers. Kiki got married three or four times and had babies, all of which were stillborn. They were buried somewhere. After her last husband left for a young girl who looked like Kiki when she was pretty in white, Kiki got sick and came back to Mama’s house with jewelry and fur coats and dresses and cars, but without health insurance. Kiki did not look pretty anymore. Kiki did not chat anymore. She lay in her room and got sicker and sicker, and one day died without saying a word. Zuzu buried Kiki in the backyard next to the baby.

Mama was very sad. She could not eat any of the things that grew in the backyard. Mama said, “I lost the smart one, then I lost the pretty one.” Zuzu turned to Mama and opened her mouth and said, “Take it easy, Mama. I survived.”

Then Mama realized that she had never had triplets, but only one daughter.

Zuzu and Mama lived together, and the garden kept growing. Mama began to recognize what had been there all along.

Author’s note

This story comes from a time when my inner world lived in fragments. The figures are not separate people, but parts of a psyche shaped by survival. Zuzu, in her own way, held what could still grow.

The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Prince

Posted on by SomatiCat

Author’s note: This story is about trying to become something else and forgetting what you already are.

There was an ugly frog with a huge head, short legs, and even shorter arms in a pond. His head was so huge that even when he was a tadpole, he could not swim through the rocks with the others. They made fun of him.

His legs were so short that when he became a tadpole with legs, he could not paddle as fast as the others. They made fun of him.

His arms were shorter still, so when he became a tadpole with short legs and shorter arms, he could not crawl on the ground like the others. They made fun of him.

When he finally became an ugly frog—with a huge head, short legs, and shorter arms—others did not laugh at him so much. The pond was full of ugly frogs. Some had huge heads. Some had short legs. Some had shorter arms. So he became just another regular ugly frog.

He was heavy, and his legs were short, so when he walked and jumped, he made ridiculous noises.

Flop. Flip. Blap. Blop.

He had a friend who was smart and slender. When he jumped, he made a cute sound.

Hip hop. Hip hip.

Everybody liked the smart and slender frog. He was a good joker. Everybody laughed and loved it. He sang and danced well, and everybody wanted to dance and sing with him. When the ugly frog sang and danced, everybody just laughed at him—even though his singing was not so bad.

When the ugly frog was still an ugly tadpole, he once saw a princess sitting on the grass by the pond. She was blonde and blue-eyed, slender and snow-white. The princess was reading a book to her little sister.

The ugly tadpole listened to the story, but he didn’t understand it because he did not know human language. An old frog who could speak human language told the story for him.

It was a story of an ugly duckling who turned out to be a snow-white swan.

The ugly tadpole dreamed that he would turn out to be a majestic, snow-white king frog. It was fine. Many tadpoles in the pond dreamed the same dream, although they wanted to be regular majestic king frogs—dark green with black dots and shiny skin.

After the ugly tadpole became an ugly frog, he saw the princess again sitting on the grass with a book.

This time, he crawled up onto the ground—Flop. Flap. Blap. Blop.—then hid himself in the grass and peered into the book.

Even though he could’t read human language, he could look at the pictures.

It was a story of a frog. No—it was a story of a prince who had been turned into a frog by a wicked witch. A beautiful princess kissed the frog, the curse was broken, and Ta-ra-ra, he became a prince.

The princess and the prince lived happily ever after.

The ugly frog believed that he was a prince who had been turned into a frog. And if he could find a princess who would kiss him, he would become human again.

It was a tragedy that he had forgotten he had been an ugly tadpole since he hatched from an egg.

The ugly frog thought he had to learn human language to be a prince. He ignored the fact that if he had been a prince, he should already have known human language.

He joined the Human Language Speaking Society. Members spoke human language to each other with a funny ribit ribit accent.

“Heloribit, howribit are youribit?”
“I am finribit, thankibit.”
“I am very pleasiribit to seeeeerribit youribit.”
“Thank youribit very muchibit.”

The ugly frog studied hard—harder and harder—so he could become an ambassador to the pond in the princess’s castle.

He began to speak better human language than the others, even though he still had a heavy ribit ribit accent.

Then one day, his smart, slender friend was sent to the castle.

The ugly frog was upset. Since his friend could not speak human language at all, he did not understand why his friend was chosen instead of him.

So he studied harder. And harder.

When the smart, slender frog hip hop hipped into the castle, a wizard appeared.

The wizard liked the way the frog hopped and jumped and sang and danced, so he said:

“Your hopping and jumping and singing made me happy. I will give you a reward. Make a wish, and I will make it come true.”

Since the smart frog did not understand human language, he did not make a wish. He simply hipped and hopped and jumped on, and went to the pond in the castle.

The wizard smiled and made his wish come true.

The smart frog stayed in the pond, singing and dancing and hipping and hopping, enjoying his life there. After a while, he went home happily.

And he lived happily—hipping and hopping and dancing and singing.

Then the ugly frog left the pond and went to the castle without being appointed to anything.

When the ugly frog flip-flop blopped to the castle, he saw the wizard.

The ugly frog jumped on his short legs and said:

“Helloribit. Howribit doibit youribit doibit.”

The wizard frowned, because the frog’s accent was so heavy that he could not understand what he was saying.

Contrary to general belief, the wizard had never been mean. So he gently asked:

“What are you doing here in the castle, far from your native pond, little frog?”

The ugly frog answered:

“I arbit notttt a ffffrogit. I rrrrrribit am a prrrrince. I havvverrrribit come to seerrrribt a prinncess.”

The wizard listened patiently and realized that the frog somehow believed he was a prince turned into a frog.

The problem was that the wizard had never turned any prince into any frog—ugly or not ugly. In fact, he did not like that story at all.

However, the wizard was too kind to tell the frog the truth. He thought that perhaps some other wizard was responsible.

So he asked, “What do you want?”

The frog said, “Human!!!”

The wizard made his wish come true.

The ugly frog became an ugly human being—with a huge head, short legs, and shorter arms—naked and greenish.

And he still spoke with that funny frog accent.

He ran to a pond in the castle and looked into the water to see his reflection.

Then he jumped into the water and tried to drown himself.

No…

He failed.

Because the ugly frog would never forget how to swim.

That is what he was.

A frog.

© 1992

The Wayfarer: The Empty Chair

Posted on by SomatiCat

On life, death, and the illusion in between.

The Wayfarer walked into a grassland with no beginning and no end. Brown leaves rustled as he walked through the knee-high grasses. It was like autumn before winter, stood still for eternity. The sky was gray, with no sun in sight. He couldn’t tell the time of day.

Like scattered drops of rain striking the surface of dried mud, he saw green spots far apart in the distance. They were trees, still alive. The brown grassland was sparsely marked with droplets of green.

The Wayfarer walked toward one of the trees, and he saw a man sitting under it. He looked as old as the grassland. His skin was dry, like the leaves of the grasses, almost peeling away from him.

“Hello,” the Wayfarer said.

The man did not move. His gaze was set toward the far end of the grassland, which seemed never to end. The tree was quiet. No birds nested in it. It simply stood there, without even casting a shadow on the earth.

Leaving the old man behind, he kept walking toward another tree far ahead. No insects leaped from the grasses. Only the sound of rustling leaves could be heard as he walked through them.

Under the second tree, the Wayfarer found a younger man sitting as well.

“Hello,” he said.

The man did not even look at him. He looked like a soldier after a defeated battle. Caked mud covered his legs, and his face was stained with soot. His gaze, too, was set toward the far end of the grassland.

The trees were far apart. Whenever he saw a faint green dot in the sea of grasses, like an island in a desert, he walked toward it, unhurried and steady. One after another, he saw a person, young or old, sitting under a tree, all gazing far away from here, into the beyond, in silence and stillness. He did not know how many trees he visited. He did not know how long he had been walking.

The Wayfarer came upon another tree and stopped in his tracks. After so many occupied chairs, all frozen in time, an absence felt like thunder in the silent sky. The chair was empty. Had the person who sat there just left? he wondered. Was it the beginning or the end? Then he noticed a beautiful mandala on the ground beneath the tree, glimmering and shimmering with many colors.

He suddenly felt tired and sat in the chair, his gaze set on the faraway horizon. Then he noticed a spider lowering itself from a branch on a strand of silk. As the Wayfarer watched, it spun its web between the branches. The intricate web overlapped his view of the never-ending grassland, and he did not know whether he was staring at the end or the beginning.

A butterfly came dancing on iridescent wings. It was like a light in the bleak landscape. Then it was caught in the spider’s web. The last fluttering of its wings sent waves through the silk. Another butterfly came and was trapped, and another. The spider wrapped them in silk, and their wings were torn free and fell to the ground like cherry blossom petals, glimmering and shimmering.

The Wayfarer realized that the mandala was made of thousands of butterfly wings, lives caught in the web and fallen there. It had been repeated from the beginning of time into its never-ending present.

He looked back to where he had come from and found that his tracks, too, had formed a spider’s web.

©2026 JU

Grandma’s Tree

Posted on by SomatiCat

There was a grandmother who had no grandchildren. She loved woods and forests and traveled all over the world. When she was younger, she went abroad in search of unusual trees in strange forests, in strange countries.

When she got a little older, she could no longer endure the cold of Iceland in winter or the boiling heat of India in summer. So she began to look for trees in her own country. She went to the Green Mountains, the White Mountains, the Blue Mountains, the Red Mountains, the Yellow Mountains—name any mountains in this country, and she had been there. Not only mountains, but swamps and bayous in the South, to see cypress trees with Spanish moss hanging from their branches. She took pictures of trees and drew maps so she could visit them again.

When she got older, she could no longer fly across the country or drive over the great plains. So she began to visit mountains and forests nearby. She drove to national parks and forests in the region and walked the trails until she found a tree that quietly drew her in. She still took pictures and made maps. The walls of her house were covered with trees.

When she got older and could no longer drive, her nephews and nieces took turns bringing her to the lake, where she sat in a chair and looked at the forest beyond.

Finally, she became too old to travel and sat in a wheelchair. The children of her nephews and nieces sometimes pushed her to a nearby park. She no longer took pictures or drew maps. She simply sat under a tree and spent one or two hours looking at the trees.

One of her nephews understood why she had traveled all over the world taking pictures of trees. She had never told anyone, but to the boy it was obvious. She had been searching for a tree to die under, so that her spirit could enter the tree and live on.

He was eager to know which tree it would be. Whenever he visited her house, he studied the photographs on the walls. Was it that grand sequoia, or that mighty oak? Or the bristlecone pine in the desert? He promised himself that whatever tree she chose, he would take her there. He would bring her back to it.

Whenever he asked her, she only smiled and said, “I will let you know when the time comes.”

The grandmother grew older still, until she could no longer leave her bed. She still had not told the boy which tree she had chosen, and he began to worry she would not be able to make the journey.

Then one morning, the time came.

She called the boy and asked him to take her to the backyard.

There stood a tree with nothing particular about it. In fact, no one had really noticed it before. It was not young, nor old. It was simply a tree no one paid attention to. The boy pushed her wheelchair to it. She stayed there for a while and died quietly.

The boy could not understand why she had chosen this ordinary tree. Even if she could not travel far, there were still many dignified trees in the nearby forest that would have suited her better. He had promised to take her anywhere. And after thousands of photographs of thousands of trees all over the world, she had chosen this unmarked tree in her own backyard—a tree she had never once taken a picture of.

After her funeral, the boy entered his grandmother’s room. He took the photographs down from the wall one by one. On the back of each photo, the name of the tree, the date, and the place were carefully written—except for one.

It was a picture of an unremarkable tree in a deep and remarkable forest.

On the back it only read:

Kiquawa tree.

No place. No date.

“I will find it,” the boy said. “I will visit them all and find that tree. Then I will understand why.”

Author’s note: This story is about a lifelong search that slowly turns inward. The grandmother’s journey is a necessary wandering until the difference between one tree and another begins to dissolve. It’s the search of identity, which is only found in yourself and each person needs their own journey.

© 1994

Kiquawa Tree

Posted on by SomatiCat

When heaven slept, dreaming a dream of a thousand rivers in the sky, its only child crawled out of the cradle of wind, crawled to the edge of the cloud, and fell to the earth.The wingless child fell without a wail, and died.

When heaven lost its only child, the first drop of its tear fell upon a Kiquawa tree on a hill. Then it turned into rain that would never end. It rained and rained upon all the creatures of the earth. Day turned into night, and the earth turned into the sea, at the bottom of which the drowned forest stood silently, like a wingless bird without a singing voice.

The Kiquawa tree on the hill looked down upon the earth and up toward the sky, and asked heaven not to let its tears flood the world.Heaven said,

How can you tell me not to cry? I have lost my only child. My child fell to the earth. The earth engulfed my wingless child and did not give it back. I look down and see the earth full of beings, yet none are mine. My tears will never cease, until all the earth lies beneath the sea of my sorrow, as silent as the starless night of the sky.

The Kiquawa tree said,

Then let me bear your child. I will take in your tears and nurse the child with them. I will give my limbs for its bones. Your tears will be its blood, and its flesh will grow. When it grows, it will worship you from the earth. You will have forests full of children to look upon you.

After one hundred sixty-eight days and nights, the rain quietly ceased. Half of the night turned into day, and the Kiquawa tree bore a child. It suckled tears from the earth. The earth grew dry, and birds began to sing.Then another Kiquawa tree bore another child, who suckled more tears from the earth. Gradually, half of the sea returned to land, and the forest was filled with children of the Kiquawa trees.

When the wingless children grew, they admired heaven, whose tears had become their blood. When a child died upon the earth, it was buried beneath a Kiquawa tree. Its bones returned to the tree, and the tree drank its blood and returned it to heaven as morning mist. Somewhere in the forest, another Kiquawa tree would bear another child.

Still, from time to time, heaven silently sheds tears for the only child it lost long ago.

© 1996 J.U.

Author’s note:

This story is a myth of grief that cannot be undone. What is lost is not recovered, but transformed. Through the body and the earth, sorrow becomes life again.

Of course, the images are AI generated.

Tear of Hannya: The Fire that Became the Sea

Posted on by SomatiCat

This is a story about what happens when the fight does not end, even after the war is over.

When the nervous system is constantly in survival mode, the sympathetic nervous system—what we call the “fight, flight, or freeze” response—is always activated. Over time, these neural pathways become automatic. We remain on alert, scanning for danger, ready to fight back.

You may have survived many battles of childhood trauma. Even after the war is over, the nervous system continues to live on the battlefield of the original trauma.

Cognitive understanding alone is not enough to activate the parasympathetic nervous system, because we do not feel safe. We may have never known what a safe home feels like. Eventually, the sympathetic nervous system forgets the original source of fear and becomes a demon that fights for fighting’s sake.

This demon once protected the vulnerable child we used to be. Now we are grown, and we can protect ourselves. And yet, the demon cannot let go of its role.

Over time, new pathways can form—slowly, one day at a time—to free the demon and show it that it can finally rest. We are not trying to erase the demon. We meet it with compassion and allow it to be held. After all, it was the demon that kept us alive.

This is a story of C-PTSD and recovery. I wrote it more than twenty years ago. I understood what I needed to understand, cognitively. But it took decades to become familiar with the feeling of safety.

I hope this helps you release the exhausted warrior within you.

Hannya’s Tear

An old woman stood on a desolate beach, staring out at the sea. The ocean wind blew through her long gray hair. The hour was neither night nor day, neither dusk nor dawn. The sea was calm. Beyond it, the blue-gray shadow of distant land floated on the horizon.

She had come a long way. So long that it could not belong to a single lifetime. She had walked through several lives to finally arrive at this distant sea.

I am tired.
So tired.
I want to die.

The wind moves through my hair—hair that was once so angry it flamed upward and burned the sky.

Blazing visceral anger burned my entrails like an ungutted fish thrown into a fire. It charred me from the inside out. Now my heart has lost the heat of burning coal and left me with ash-gray hair.

Every step I took was across shards of tile and gravel.

Every Breath I drew was studded with broken glass.

Where did I come from? I no longer remember. It was too long ago.

All the way here I slashed, stabbed and sliced. Blood gushed and sprayed over me—on my face, my neck, my arms. It burned my skin and hardened it into rusted iron.

I hid in dark places for days and nights, wounded and motionless while the shadows of enemies passed by. I was always watching, always alert. And when I slept, I dreamed of blood and dismemberment, waking to the smell of burning flesh.

That was the only way I knew.

It was my way.

In my hand I see a sword darkened with dried blood.
I have become the thing I feared.
An Oni who only knows how to fight.

And now I find myself standing alone on this beach. No more bodies to leave behind me. Where is my fire? Where is my anger.

It is gone.

There is no enemy left to kill.

What did I do to deserve lives of perpetual fighting? I have survived, and there is no one left to kill. And I am standing here alone.

I am tired.

I want to die.

I want to end this for good. No more fighting. No more bloodshed. No more hiding. I want to dissolve into total oblivion. No more memories. No more me.

Then what is holding me here on this silent beach?

The waves come and go, come and go, through thousands of nights and days.

Let me dissolve into that place where sea and sky are indistinguishable. That is the only way I can stop fighting.

Please do not make me turn into an Oni again.

“Who is it?”

The Oni suddenly turned.

For a moment her hair flared upward. Her muscles tightened. Her eyes widened. Her hand gripped the sword, ready to kill.

Then she saw a little girl.

The girl slowly stepped out from the woods and walked toward the Oni. With every stride she grew older—her hair longer, her legs stronger, her eyes wiser.

The Oni remembered the girl.

Three or four lifetimes ago she had begun fighting for the child, to protect a helpless, vulnerable little girl.

Then she forgot the child.

And after that, she forgot what she had been fighting for—or against.

She fought simply for the sake of fighting.

That was when she became an Oni.

And now look—the child has grown into a woman, soft as she wishes to be, supple as she needs to be. She is smiling.

And look—she beans not even a scratch.

The Oni felt her anger flare again.

I was the one who fought all the way here.

Where were you when I lay in a ditch, holding my breath in the darkest hour of the night?

The Oni faced the woman and raised her sword high.

She was about to strike when the woman said quietly,

“I am your way.”

The sword shattered in the Oni’s hands.

And in the woman’s hand a sword appeared—clean as the first beam of morning sunlight falling across a hill heavy with dew.

She thrust it through the Oni.

Sweet breath flowed through her like sunlight streaming through leaves.

The Oni shed a single tear.

With that tear she dissolved into her,

becoming the sea and the wind—

where she is no more and dreams no dreams.

You are home.

Images are AI created.

©J.U. 2004