The land lies blank, its eyes glazed over gray,
A hazy still from films in black and white.
Long since has color faded all away,
So faded, day cannot be told from night.

And sun flares down, and moon shines down, upon
An earth that’s masked eternally by clouds.
They cannot know that danger comes with dawn,
In form of willow in his foggy shroud.

For earth was wearied of her pallor drawn
And longed again to feel the joy of light.
She searched for a knight of valor strong
To bring to her once more the blush of life.

She chose the willow, giving him a blade
Of ice, a sparkling blade to slit the sun.
A blade he fastened to an arrow made
Of heartwood strong with wispy string he’d spun.

With arrow clutched in hand, he parts the smoke,
Advancing towards the sun with caution slow.
And then he strikes down sun with just one stroke.
The sun is pierced! But then begins to glow.

He glows with fiery fury burning hot,
The wound begins to ooze a magma that
To earth pours steaming, vengeance for the shot.
The magma tears through earth, a vicious wildcat.

All water dries away, the rivers dead.
The ocean by this raging flame consumed.
Though nothing could escape it, all have fled.
The willow, first to die, in ash entombed.

The fiery magma fades away, and leaves
An earth with smoking scars. An earth that longed
For just a touch of color, only grieves.
Her tears dried up, she mourns with eerie song.

As tiny embers smolder in the air,
Through space an arrow flies, and longs for home.
And to the willow drawn, it stops midair,
And hurtles back to willow on earth’s dome.

By chance it happened, chance and nothing more.
For as the arrow flew back swift and straight
And homewards drawn, towards whom should arrow soar?
The moon, who calmly waits for painful fate.

And when the arrow struck, moon only sighed.
As waterfalls of clear sweet silver fell,
Pale colors shimmering misty in the light.
And then poured aquas, crystal clear as bells.

Rich purples, orchids, falling from the sky
To earth and melting over all the land,
The smoke like frightened flocks of birds takes flight
The magma remnants washed away as sand.

And to the willow’s tomb of ash the blade
Of ice sped fast and pierced. Into the earth
The heartwood dove, beneath the earth remade.
But now, in world of color, gains rebirth.