I once wrote about a large beautiful aloe in my nature journal.   One winter I neglected to bring the plant indoors and it shriveled up and died.  I was strangely sad.  I saved the dried leaves and began painting.  It soon transformed into something much more than the original plant.  

The evolution (in more or less chronological order):

"I have come to my garden, my sister [my] bride..."  --Song of Songs