The Gardner
Author: Lisa Suhay

A man planted a garden and he filled it with dozens of flowering plants and trees.

There were dogwood trees and cherry trees, sprays of wisteria, rows of daffodils and mountains of azaleas. The garden was a riot of color and fragrance, still the man was disappointed year after year because the one tree he wanted to see flower produced the buds and no more.

For months the man labored, hauling fertilizer, pruning the branches, mulching the base. He spoke to the tree and watered it lovingly.

While he cared for the rest of the garden he could never sit back and enjoy it because his anticipation of the great tree was too powerful.

His unhappiness did not go unnoticed among the plants he tended.

The rhododendron with its brilliant purple blooms shed petal tears when the man only gave it a cursory nod.

The bluebells clanged in discord when he yanked the weeds, but failed to stop and admire them. The roses lifted their faces so that he might inhale their heady fragrance as he passed, but he only muttered about killing the aphids he spotted on their leaves.

"This has to stop," cried the garden gnome that lay on its side after the man had stubbed his toe on it and thus kicked it over. "What is that silly tree he goes on and on about? I have never heard him speak its name."

A voice croaked from the toad abode in the shadow of a birch, "That is the If Only tree to which he tends."

"Oh dear," said the weeping willow and began to cry fresh tears. "Not one of those. They're always a disappointment."

The If Only tree was known to everyone in the garden as the one plant that took all a gardener had to give and never bloomed in return.

It was said that if a gardener fed it his hopes, his dreams and his fears it would give him his heart's desire some day. But while the tree grew to enormous height and girth its buds withered on the branches. The danger was great. It would inevitably wear the gardener down and when he stopped doting on it the tree would leech the life from the rest of the garden. All would wither and die.

The garden fell silent as the man returned to sit on the marble bench by his favorite tree. He sat by it for hours and spoke and spoke and none had listened before today. Now they all perked up and strained to hear his words.

"If only I had a bigger house," he told the tree, "Then I could be happy. If only I had a better car I could take my children to the zoo or to visit the relatives."

Then the gardener's wife came into the garden and sat beside her husband and spoke to the tree. "If only I were thin, then I would be happy. If only I were beautiful, then I would have friends."

When the couple left the garden the tree grew another inch and the shadow it cast over the garden made the other plants shiver.

"We have to nip this in the bud," barked the dogwood.

"To late for that," snapped the snapdragon

It was Lilly who intervened with a plan to save the garden.

"We must talk to the wind," she said. "We must ask it to bring a terrible storm and strike the tree and down it with a bolt of lightening."

The garden was aghast. A storm of that magnitude would surely wipe them out.

"True," said Lilly. "The storm would likely do us damage, but the If Only will surely kill the gardener as well."

So it was done and the plants asked the wind to rage and it did. The garden was decimated. Flowers and trees were strewn in every direction, but to their horror, the If Only tree stood tall as ever.

The man entered the garden and wept. Looking at the ruin, he pictured his beautiful garden. He knew that, while he had tended it, he had not appreciated it. "If Only..." he sighed.

The tree shook with laughter. The man jumped back in shock.

"Such a foolish man," it laughed. "You still have me."

Then the man heard a small, silvery voice. Lilly, who lay at the base of its trunk, said, "Root it out. It's your only chance. All of the beauty and glory you once sewed will grow back once the If Only tree is dead and gone."

The man knew she was right, but the tree suddenly seemed so large that he doubted he could do the job. It was too much work and he was tired and sick at heart.

"Get your wife to come and help you. Call a friend, a brother and neighbor to help you," Lilly pleaded.

"The man shrugged, "That would be too humiliating," he said.

Another voice called from a tangle of plants, the gnome shouted, "More humiliating than being dictated to by a malignant growth? Come on man, show some spunk. You put your back into building things, growing things, pulling the little weeds so that the garden would grow. Now you have to pull the big one so that it can be revived."

Other small voices of the bulbs he had planted called out to him from beneath the soil, "We will come back to you. You must be strong."

So he swallowed his pride and went to fetch his wife and his neighbors and between them they chopped down the If Only tree and dug out the stump and burned it on a great pyre.

The next year the man, his wife, his neighbors and friends all gathered in the garden, among the new sprigs and blooms to erect a sundial where the If Only tree had once stood.

They placed it there to remind them that shadows pass and with time all can be green again.








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Lisa Suhay is a correspondent for the New York Times and author of the book "Tell Me a Story," original fables for adults and children.

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