The Willow Spirit

By the banks of the Wei River stood an ancient willow, so thick that ten men might join hands around it, its age beyond reckoning. Its branches dipped to the water, and when the wind passed through them they whispered; the villagers named it the Wind-Listening Willow.

Zhou Ye was a youth of the village, orphaned of his father and living with his mother, who earned his bread by ferrying travelers across the stream. He was a plain, honest lad, fond of wine, and often lay drunk beneath the willow, talking to the tree as if it knew his whole life.

One day a great thunderstorm came. Ye had moored his boat and was turning home when he saw, at a split in the willow's trunk, a clear green sap welling like blood. He took pity, tore a strip from his own coat to bind the wound, and from that day on, whenever he passed, he would pour out a libation of wine and talk to the tree as to an old friend. The neighbors laughed at his foolishness, but Ye paid them no mind.

That autumn the waters rose in flood. Ye was ferrying passengers when the boat capsized midstream. He struck out through the water, clutching a broken oar, till his strength failed and he began to sink. Then, as in a haze, a supple branch wound about his wrist and drew him toward the shore. When he woke he lay upon the sand, and beside him stood a young woman in a green skirt, her hair hanging like willow threads; she gave her name as Willow Maid, and said she dwelt within the tree. Ye marveled, but spent with weariness he closed his eyes and slept.

After that the Willow Maid came each night, mending Ye's clothes and warming his gruel; when his mother fell ill she gathered herbs to tend her. The neighbors thought it strange and peeped, and saw the green-skirted figure passing in and out among the willow boughs, but all were struck silent with wonder and none dared speak of it.

There came a rich merchant, Old Qian, traveling through, who wished to fell the ancient willow for the timber of a great boat, and set his hired men with axes to the task. Ye ran to the tree and threw his body before it; an axe gashed his brow and the blood ran down his face, yet he would not move. Qian in anger bade his servants drive him off. Suddenly a great wind rose, and the willow's branches lashed about like whips, flinging Qian's men to the ground and casting the axes into the river. Qian took fright and fled, crying out, and never again dared speak of felling the willow.

The next year Ye's mother died, and he grieved as if his heart would break. The Willow Maid said to him, "Your kindness the willow has repaid. The years upon a branch are no long dwelling in the world of men. Care for yourself, and take heart to live." With that she melted into a wisp of green mist and drifted, slender and slow, back into the tree. Ye stayed to keep the willow company, and the tree put forth a new shoot whose tender branches brushed his shoulder, as if with a warmth of feeling, like the old whispered talk.

The Chronicler remarks: Plants without sense yet know to repay a debt; how many men turn their backs on what they owe. One slender willow thread held a living man's life and answered a foolish lad's true heart, coming and going without regret — is she not worthier than those who forget kindness and break faith? Yet Ye's simple honesty won the willow's pity precisely because it was genuine. The cold turns of the world, shifting at a breath, are often less faithful than an old willow tree that remembers.