Somewhere along the way, this experience came to bear the sweet fruit of serenity in friendship. I bit into its juicy flesh as it burst forth with the sweet nectar of serendipity in willing companionship.
In time, there was nothing left of the fruit except the remnants of all that remained. In hard stems and stony seeds, I found little remained of all that once gave me life. Left with these traces of life, I buckled down to make of what remained what I could.
Like an amateur that gardened in the abstract, I tended to the earth to make of these bare stores what I could. I tilled the earth, making sure to fertilise with ions of nitrogen and phosphorous. I dug a pit for the stony seed, making sure it was of significant depth — large seeds require more depth. I watered the soils time after time, day after day, impatiently waiting for life to bloom.
One day, a lonely sprout began to peek out from the giving earth. Hungry for the light of the sun, the little bud grew quickly. A soft, green stem gathered all of its will, working to garner substance. Soon, it knew the strength of supple wood. The meek stem slowly rounded in girth, growing in height as it did. What were once tender blades sprouting from stems became flurries of foliage attached to branches. The light brown body of the tree deepened in colour and developed in maturity, knowing the dark brown bark of age.
The essence of friendship had borne life through the seeds I was left with. Blossoms adorned the growth that had come from that which I tended to. Fragrant floral scents filled the air, permeating the atmosphere surrounding me. The perfume carried notes of melancholia and sorrow, singing bittersweet reminiscence in an ode to a past long lived to be forgotten. The perfection of youth was captured in overtones, where undertones betrayed love lost.
In time, I did not need to tend to the structure embedded within this earth. Nature brought forth days in which pouring rains were followed by clear skies and sunlight. With nature’s preordained provision, the tree slowly grew to bear fruit. When the first fruits came, I grew resolute — I would wait. Eventually, the tree grew encumbered with abundance in the form of life.
Navigating my way upwards through middling branches, I climbed up the tree a small way to pick a few fruits. I carefully climbed down once I was done. All I needed was a few.
Sitting against the trunk of the tree with the fruits I placed in a small pile beside me, I picked one up and approximated its appearances. It looked nothing like the fruit whose life birthed this tree. Gingerly, in the hesitation of uncertainty, I took a small bite of the fruit.
As my taste-buds exploded with a complex blend of feeling, I knew a flavour bittersweet in essence. In a moment so spiritual, I was transported to a memory of the past that lived in a sphere I once thought was beyond me.
I didn’t understand why this was happening.
I tried another.
Bittersweet in essence, I was transported to yet another memory of the past, once thought to be long lost to me. Fruit after fruit carried memory after memory, going beyond the bounds of friendship.
In having shared an experience that goes beyond the bounds of that which lives to be immortal, it lives to be no surprise that it goes beyond me. The remnants of bonds fated to be mortal reside in spaces in time.
Somewhere along the way, I fostered the growth of life alone. The life that bloomed from a seed of friendship grew to become something more of than that which it came from. In the abandonment of companionship, I cannot help but to feel blessed to know that the seeds with which I was left with spawned a semblance of life for myself to tend to.
In the solace of this sanctum, I find bliss in solitude.
I find reverie in the reminiscence of the taste of a bittersweet fruit.
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