Carpe Diem #992 Willow

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at this belated episode "willow". I love to share some ideas and meanings about the "willow" here with you.

Many uses and associations can be traced back to our Celtic ancestors' observations of the willow tree in their natural environment. Druid priests, dryads (priestesses), bards and ovates all recognized the willow's affinity to watery domains. Flora and fauna in close connection with water are considered dwellers of the psychic realm, and symbolic of inspired imagination.

The willow gets its moon associations (another powerful symbol of psychic and intuitive energy) because of its relationship to water. We see this when we recognize the moon's influence over the waters of the earth - it moves the tides, pulling fluids to and fro with her own wax and wane.

Recognizing these natural unions, ancient Celtic spiritual leaders considered the willow a container for water/moon attributes and thus utilized its wood and branches to invoke deeper connections to their intuitive purposes. The Celts understood that the willow was instrumental in bringing about psychic visions that produced a clearer understanding of the world in which they lived.

Other valuable traits of the willow include its flexibility. The willow is one of the few trees that can bend in outrageous poses without snapping. This is a powerful metaphor for those of us on a spiritual path. The message here is to adjust with life rather than fight it.

In all, the willow reminds us to take heed of this lesson: Keep growing and reaching higher no matter where you are planted.

Willow

We have had several times "willow" as prompt here at CDHK and I think it's a very inspiring tree. We need to grown further in our haiku writing skills and in that goal we can help each other in a great way.

Here are a few examples of haiku inspired on willow, from my archives:

First a tanka:

autumn departs
in deep silence willow leaves fall -
tears on this grave
as the willow is green again
another year has gone

© Chèvrefeuille

tears of a geisha
her virginity lost to a soldier -
pussy willow blooms

© Chèvrefeuille

And a last one to conclude this episode about the willow. This one I wrote in the first month of our existence, October 2012:

weeping willow

in the autumn sunlight
a golden tree

© Chèvrefeuille

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until July 12th at noon (CET). Our next episode, Ash, I have published too today. So two new episodes on one day. Have fun!