Why The Aspen Quivers
:
ARBOR DAY
:
Good Stories For Great Holidays
OLD LEGEND
Long, long ago, so the legend says, when Joseph and Mary and the Holy
Babe fled out of Bethlehem into Egypt, they passed through the
green wildwood. And flowers and trees and plants bent their heads in
reverence.
But the proud aspen held its head high and refused even to look at the
Holy Babe. In vain the birds sang in the aspen's branches, entreating it
to gaze for o
e moment at the wonderful One; the proud tree still held
its head erect in scorn.
Then outspake Mary, his mother. "O aspen tree," she said, "why do you
not gaze on the Holy Child? Why do you not bow your head? A star arose
at his birth, angels sang his first lullaby, kings and shepherds came to
the brightness of his rising; why, then, O aspen, do you refuse to honor
your Lord and mine?"
But the aspen could not answer. A strange shivering passed through its
stem and along its boughs, which set its leaves a-quivering. It trembled
before the Holy Babe.
And so from age to age, even unto this day, the proud aspen shakes and
shivers.