Because she was leafless, the patient sun seemed useless. She had no chloroplast to photosynthesise such kindness, except the naked branches – that could not even house a hummingbird – awaiting to be fortunately fetched and chopped for fire. Gone were those green days, when she could dauntlessly dance to the heavy drumming of the mid-latitudes’ wind without wearing a shabby look. She was the winter’s victim.
Because she was leafless, every bird felt unsafe, leaving her lonely to the wicked winter that defaced her. But time tells the story differently: she was watchfully waiting for who would discover the life in her. Winter withered her leaves, leaving her alive, but leafless; the daily snowfall masked her branches with brief beauty, that disappeared at each appearance of sunrays. Her dreamt days were delayed with temptations of despair.
Because she was leafless, she was buried before dying, sentenced without trial, forgotten before dawn… What a life of hopeless hope! And here lies the difference: hopeless hope! The story of a treeless leaf is different from the hope of a leafless tree; it is better to be a clothesless winter tree – stripped of youthfulness – than a yellow autumn leaf – left without roots. The winter tree is never hopeless.
Because she was not lifeless, the first droplets from the sky aroused her smiles, surprising some past perchers and passers-by with sprouting shoots. Her bracing beauty left no bird unseduced, not even an aging eagle. She mothered many features: fresh shades with many guests, lanceolate leaves with green pigment, sweet scents silently swimming in the cold breeze … Winter is gone!
Because she was not lifeless, she resisted a viral virus in her vicinity, while waiting for her priceless spring. Her wedding with the April guest changed the world like the meeting of Divinity and Humanity in Nazareth. Spring alone is enough to wake the winter tree.
Because she was not lifeless, she could generate life again and again. Her third day had come, like the Easter Day of Christians, after forty days of leaflessness. Her faithful branches were rewarded with fresh fruits for their patience; for they remained in the winter tree, and the winter tree in them.