Japanese Garden II

The Bonsai
The Bonsai plant came to be popular over 1000 years ago, regarded for their bent and gnarled trunks that were said to resemble animals. Many legends and myths still stir in the delicate foilage in present day. Close to five hundred years ago, an old man from simsville was said to have traveled many, many moons to reach a land that held mystical powers with which to heal his ailing goat. The man walked cross deserts and sailed crossed raging seas, finally arriving only to find the mystical powers of the land to be a myth.

Spending all his money and worldy goods to get to the land, he found himself stranded and penniless. The only way to cross the sea to return home was to build a boat. The man spent many more moons preparing a make shift vessel out of trees from the mystical land. Alas the time came to sail. The sea was angry that day my friends, and the hand-made boat was tossed, turned and battered against the waves of steel. The old man fought hard, but in vain and was taken by the sea. All that remained was gnarled pieces of wood that were washed ashore.

One day an old woman was walking the shoreline where she met upon a goat looking out into the water. The goat seemed ill and saddened. The old woman approached the strange animal. He looked fragile and half starved. All she could find to feed him were pieces of bark from strange, twisted wood rotting in the ground. Moments later, the glaze disappeared from the animals eyes, and he turned to the old woman and looked at her with a strange knowledge and realization of something. The woman took the goat home and cared for him. Many years later, they were laid to rest side by side under the strange trees that now grow where the mysterious gnarled wood lay rotting in the ground many years before.