Second Canto 6

Canto VI: The Last Reflection

When the willow on the island had stood a hundred years, its roots reached deep enough to touch the lake’s oldest dreams.
The people no longer feared the water. They built their homes along its edge, raised children who swam in its shallows, and sang lullabies that began with, “Once, a lady lived here.”

They did not remember her name, only her kindness — and that was enough.

But sometimes, when the moon was high and the willow’s shadow touched the shore, the elders would tell of a time when light had been a blade, when songs could break mirrors, when courage had remade the world. And the children, wide-eyed, would ask if the Lady was still beneath the water.

“No,” the elders said. “She walks among us now, though she wears many faces.”

One night, a child wandered down to the lake alone. The air was cool, the stars trembling like dew upon black glass. She knelt at the edge and peered into the stillness.

At first, she saw only her own reflection. Then, as the wind stirred, the image changed. Another face appeared beside hers — pale, calm, and smiling with the quiet knowing of the deep.

“Who are you?” the child whispered.

“A memory,” said the reflection. “And a promise.”

The water rippled. The reflection faded. But the child felt something new — a warmth, a melody just beneath hearing, as if the lake itself had spoken through her heartbeat.

Years later, when she grew old and the willow bowed heavy with time, she told her own grandchildren:

“The Lady is gone, but the water remembers.
Look closely — and you may see yourself as she once saw you.”

And so the tale endured — not as warning, nor as prayer, but as heritage: a story of what it means to give, to lose, and to begin again.

The lake remained still. The world turned on.
And in the silence before dawn, the surface sometimes shivered —
as though light were brushing against it once more.

All songs end. Yet their echoes become the world.