The children were sent to their grandparents.
Jackass wandered about, lost and dazed, shunned by those who encountered him. He found himself on the rutted trail to the spring, at its deserted and eroded bank. Wild roses were beginning to return, but not the doves, their habitat having been destroyed.
Jackass wailed in anguish, “Why do I burn? What fire scorches my bowels and my inward parts?”
In all the wide world, nothing responded to his query. Nothing in Heaven or Hell roused to comfort or to condemn or even to comment.
“What have you done to me, Virgin, that I brim with yearning?” His tears dripped into the muddy water. “Better that I had stayed as I was born, with my eyes on the ground. As soon as I lifted my eyes to you, Virgin, then my soul sought beauty, passion, transcendence. My soul pined for that which the common ass can never have. And you triggered this desire, Virgin. You planted in me the hopeless quest.”
Jackass took a quick peek at the spring. If this were told as a fairy tale, his tears would have transformed and cleansed the water, turned it sparkling and wholesome.
No such luck. This is a fable.