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Sunday Story/ The Willow Guard

2023-10-08 15:40:00, Kulturë CNA

Sunday Story/ The Willow Guard

Many years ago, when I was working as a journalist, I had an inexplicable desire to provide my services in Cologne.

- What is the matter with this small country? - the editor-in-chief often harassed me.

- Well, I have a wife from there, that's why, - I explained to him.

I actually made my first stop at my parents' in Korça. I went with them the next day towards Erseka with the excitement that the nostalgia of the village where I grew up had given me the night before. Then I finished work in that small but clean town filled with wise, kind people. Misfortune has not yet struck with the driver Guga gas on the board towards Leskovik. The way there was a dream. Beautiful meadows and endless forests. If you were in Finland or Sweden. That's how I compared it inside my mind. And before arriving at the winery on a street corner I always saw a man leaning against a large fir tree in the twilight. With a cigarette in his mouth, as we approached him, he greeted us with his hand and laughed.

- He will not come to Leskovik because he did not signal us to stop, - said Guga.

Really, he laughed at us. Maybe it will go down, there from Korça, I gathered my mind. But we met the same man there even after three months. It was winter, there was snow, but he had a cigarette on his lips. He smiled and waved at us.

- Ore, this is not a monument because there is no way, - laughed Guga.

In fact, I was also surprised that such a precise coincidence does not happen. I forgot and we continued. More months passed, but as I said, I couldn't leave Cologne. This time after five months. It was spring, but cold there. As we were getting closer to Leskovik, the same man appeared again at the corner of the street. With a cigarette on his lips and his hand ready to greet us.

- Stop! - I shouted to the driver and jumped out of the car.

I approached the man whose hand was raised. As I got closer, the laughter faded a little.

- Hey, are you human or a ghost? - I attacked him.

- Qazimi am bro! Excavation.

- Do you sleep on the street? Every time we pass here, you appear before us as a monument.

- True. I have been living here for years. Like a monument. Hahaha. Well said.

I didn't know how to continue the conversation. But I was curious to learn what this Qazim always wanted on the street corner. He understood my interest and sat down on a stone.

- I am the guard of the willow, - he began.

- No, but the rain guard, - mocked Guga.

I thought it must be someone mentally retarded. Any of those fans who have, for example, fixed car license plates. Or those who don't fill their time with work and stay on the streets killing the day.

- Not of the byrazer rain, but of the willow.

And he directed the stick down the stream from the steepness of the relief and from the abundant water he had urinated, but with a soothing noise for the mind and ears. Like a contrabass in the hands of a virus.

- See that one over there? - he asked me.

I shook my head. It looked like a great willow with its branches curling over the water like a girl's long hair. I remembered that there were plenty of such in Voloreka in Pogradec. They almost kissed the lake. It was a sight that would have forced painters to raise their easels there.

- Well, I am the guard of that willow.

After these words I said, enough, the conversation ended. Qazim understood how smart he was. And while I left him sitting on the stone, I started towards the car, Guga asked him:

- Who keeps this willow from?

- From those who cut wood at night, brother.

- What do they want willow when there are so many pine trees around? - I wanted clarification.

- They like to fence the yards so that the foxes don't enter, - he said.

- Yes, let them saw it, o. You're in trouble because the stream will get bored! - I teased him.

- The village will be bored, - he got angry.

- How so? - I continued.

At that moment, Qazim ran away and grabbed my hand. He almost dragged me to the willow.

- Do you see these branches? - he asked me.

- Yes.

- Village children hang on these branches every morning and every lunch. These branches throw them across the stream to reach the school. It's over there. Do you see it? If the willow will be cut by the ax of some grape smuggler, then the children have to walk two hours to the village in the valley below and climb again to study at this school opposite.

He explained to me so angrily that he seemed like he would beat me if I told him that I didn't understand what he said. But the truth was that he was doing such a useful and valuable job that I missed him. I felt like hugging him, thanking him and at that moment I was motivated to write an article about him and publish it in the newspaper. But Qazim had left. He sat down on the stone above the road and turned his eyes towards Korça. As if to say, I'm done with you.

It happened that a month ago I made the Korçë - Saranda road. I passed through Erseka again and when I was coming to Leskovik at the Qazim turn, I didn't see a human foot. A few kilometers down, a friendly guesthouse had been set up. Warm, clean and so welcoming. I stopped for a coffee. The question came to me:

- That Qazim who lived on the street, where is he from?

- Qazua is drinking brandy these days.

- Who keeps the willow? Or did they cut it?

- No no. The willow is there. Rri chats with the stream. They are close friends. But we don't need it anymore.

- Why?

- That now we miss the children. They flew around the globe, - he lamented.

I ran away with the worry of emptying. There have been many travelers, but not residents. They live among that Qazimi oxygen with their neighbors. The willow shakes and sways like the tremors of trouble. He wants to play with toads. Except the noise of the little ones and the melody of the birds go in harmony with the music of the crystal waters of the stream. Willow waits. I shake the branches restlessly even with a slight breeze of hope. Like the tireless hands of a clock that never rest. Tick, tock, tock, tock...





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