The Legend of the Bamboo Forest

The royal chambermaid and the young warrior, fleeing the wrath of the heavenly palace, were flying low, their robes trailing through the air like colourful ghosts. Their elopement to the earthly domain had been condemned by the celestial throne, and now the soldiers of the pursuing army, forbidden to descend any further into the dwelling place of mortals and beasts, the line between heaven and earth being inviolable, had massed in the sky, each with a white cloud underfoot, their eyes following the desperate flight of the fugitives, two bright specks sweeping over the barren landscape far, far below. The commanding general raised his sword. Deserting the blue, Match made in heaven, earthbound, Gravity of love. The two lovers could sense that the end was near. Flying huddled together, his arm around her shoulders, they looked into each other’s eyes, a wistful smile on their lips, the wind pushing a thin strand of the chambermaid’s hair onto her face like the track of a tear. To die next to each other, just above the realm where they could be human about their love, was the second best fate they could have wished for. Doomed by human hearts, Celestials embracing fate, Flight interrupted. The sky darkened. A million jade arrows poured straight down from the heavens, blocking out sun and hope, whistling through the air, a shrill dirge, then smashed like thunderbolts into the land, their shafts and feathers quivering in a green fury at having been sunk in this filthy turf forever. Presently, deep in their midst, out of the trembling, seedless earth, appeared a pair of mysterious red flowers that, through the numberless winters since, have refused to wither. A merciless sky, A deluge of green arrows, Bamboo forest sways.