When the land was still listened to, and people took the time to see how the sky and the earth kissed at dawn and at twilight, there lived at the wild fringes of the empire, a farmer who tended his own garden with unwavering care and devotion.
Every morning, he would talk to the plants as he attended to their needs according to the season: he sowed, watered, pruned, cleaned, reaped, and was thankful without fail.
One day, as he pruned his rosebush and the twilight was approaching from the west side, he felt a longing stirring in his heart. He lived alone and would have loved to share his life with a fellow soul.
As he harboured this desire in his heart, the rosebush moved in the breeze, however slightly, and the rose scent became more intense.
He closed his eyes to inhale the smell, and when he opened them again, he saw the topmost rose open.
Then, he heard a voice.
"Your desire has called to me. I am Rose. Ask me any question."
The man looked around, but there was nobody else.
"It's like you are thinking. I am Rose, just here in front of you. You have been taking care of me for a long time, and I am very fond of you."
So it was that the farmer grew bold.
"Hello, Rose. I feel very lonely at times. How I wish you were a woman!"
The rose slowly spun, and little by little a shape emerged out of it, becoming a woman.
She had long black hair, grey eyes, and a small mole on her cheekbone.
"Here I am," she said, "but I won't stay long in this form."
Every evening, they would talk for some time, the farmer and the rose.
The time came when the farmer proposed to her:
"Come, be my wife, and live under my roof," he said.
She replied: "I can't, my dear, for if I leave the bush for long, I will die, as much as if you cut it down. Aren't you happy to converse with me every evening?"
The farmer was unhappy. He could not be satisfied, for he wanted Rose as his wife.
"If you want a wife, you should seek her among your kind," said the rose, and withdrew in the rosebush, never to appear to him as a woman again.
In vain, he asked her again and again.
In time, he learned his lesson, and kept tending and talking to the rosebush; after he married, he taught his children to tend and talk to the rosebush too.
When his first granddaughter was born, she was called Rose, and became an excellent rose grower. This started a family tradition that the first born girl of each subsequent generation should become such, and to this day, the latest of the great granddaughters of Rose's daughter is still taking care of the ancient rosebush.
