The witch tree

He took Rosy down to the edges of the lake, right where the river and meadows are subsumed by its shimmering potency, and made her sit close to him in the shade.
In the glade they felt tiny, small specks of colour within the green which rose up in leafy tree and wooded hill and even in the reflection of the water.
And just as she was relaxing and leaning back onto his chest, Vincent pointed out the witch tree.
He held his arm straight out in front, in a strong gesture toward the strange mass of vegetation growing up before them. He asked what it reminded Rosy of.
She looked for a few seconds, laughed and remarked that, to her, it seemed like one of Hannibal’s great battle elephants, rearing up, ready to crush and trample the Roman soldiers that lay before it.
He smiled and nodded, sagely, saying he was glad that she could see a creature of great potency there. Vincent however, saw a more troubling image in the strange growth of the old tree.
“It’s like a monster or a demon, there,” he said without looking at Rosy. “I’ve often thought so. Witches have always gathered there, for their Sabbaths and to mark days of great power. They’ve made many sacrifices, throughout the centuries, and the tree has grown strange and powerful, perhaps taking the form of one of their icons, their dark masters.”
Rosy smiled sweetly at him and bit her index finger. “That’s a lovely story,” she said, throwing a stone into the water, “You do take me to the best places!”
Realising he had failed to scare the girl, Vincent began to laugh. “You’ve never been here before in your life, have you?” asked Rosy, to which Vincent shook his head, grinning and scratching his eyebrow.
“In which case,” continued the girl, “I propose we take off all our clothes and swim over to inspect your ‘witch tree’. Once there, those dark pagan powers might overcome us both and then you can ravish me, if you like?”
Rosy turned her back to Vincent and began shuffling out of her jeans. Soon her milky body was preparing to step into the cool river and swim across.
“Are you coming in,” she called behind her, “Are you coming to join me, beneath the witch tree?”
But Vincent didn’t want to get up. His mind wouldn’t let go of the image he’d created and the grinning demonic tree snarled over the water at him.
How ridiculous, he thought, to grow afraid of a story of one’s own imagining. But the power of any story lies in the imagination, in the mind’s eye of the beholder, and this story had somehow reduced him to a shiver.
“I don’t feel like swimming,” he called from where he lay, “I think I’ve caught a chill.” And Rosy laughed like she never believed a word he ever said, and frolicked and splashed in the quiet summer afternoon, loving nature and loving her freedom, beneath the boughs of the old witch tree.

After Christmas

And just as soon as Christmas had begun for the town, so it ended.
After Christmas ended there were screams and running and buildings collapsing. I walked out into the street and smelt the burning and saw the blood running down the camber of the street to fill drains and gulleys.
A flash had started life somewhere inside a supermarket and I saw it grow in a split-second to cover the delicate blue of the tree.
And then came the noise; an almighty cataclysm that rattled my windows and rocked the foundations of the house, like when the earthquake hit the summer before last.
After the explosion, the town was in tatters. The brief idea of Christmas had seemed to be holding it all together, keeping the town alive. Then, in a swift blast and a huge fireball, the scene was ruined forever.
I heard an old man on the corner of the street saying he’d never be able to remember what the street used to look like. This scorched shell of a street was the only way he’d ever recall it now, in his mind’s eye.
But I walked across the road, to where the Christmas tree lay on its side. Somehow, despite every streetlight in the town having died after the blast, the wintry blue bulbs that threaded their way around the body of the fir tree still shone bright.
Perhaps they were like stars that, to us, appear to shine on long after they’ve exploded and died?
Whatever, I stood there just gazing at the tree and, before too long, the crowds that had gathered to inspect the carnage in the street began to troop across and stood in a circle around the tree.
We all just stood there in silence pondering what we were looking at, thinking about just what a small miracle was and would we know if we ever saw one.

The Christmas Tree

It was December 7th, 2007, when I first noticed they’d put the Christmas tree up in the town square.
Obscured by the skinny arms of deciduous trees, it glinted and winked at me through the freezing night air.
There was a threat of snow, maybe some sleet was falling. People were going home for the weekend; closing their shops and businesses – getting ready to turn out the lights on a week of toil, on a week of money. And what would they see, as they turned from their shop doorway, but a magnificent Scots Pine tree decked in silver blue.
If I were a shopkeeper, I think that would be enough for me. That would be enough for me to think ‘this is okay’, that this week of arrogant shoppers, time-wasting browsers and thieving children was worth it, because it’s nearly Christmas and Christmas is bigger than just me and my troubles.
See, these shopkeepers are providing a service, one that actually creates ‘Christmas’ in so many households. I’d feel privileged to be a part of that.
And I think that’s how I felt - privileged - as I gazed out at the Christmas tree, across that worsening winter’s night.