By Dianne Moritz
Mother carefully snipped a small, green cutting from her friend’s lush yard, set it to root in an old jam jar. We kids marveled, as fragile shoots spouted, buds of leaves unfurled, like baby fists, in sunlight. Sometime later, Mother planted the tiny sapling in the fertile Iowa soil by our backyard driveway. We watched in wonder, doubting its survival under scorching summer sun or cold, harsh winter. But we learned that Old Mother Nature is shrewd, and by summer’s end our tree grew four feet tall, How we loved that willow! We’d hide beneath its boughs, to read, or nap, or dream, our spot to plot adventures.
Dianne Moritz writes from her home in Southampton, NY. She is a poet and picture book author. GOING ON A GHOST HUNT will be out in fall 2022
Academy of the Heart And Mind 