Select parent element of known element in Selenium

There are a couple of options there. The sample code is in Java, but a port to other languages should be straightforward.

Java:

WebElement myElement = driver.findElement(By.id("myDiv"));
WebElement parent = (WebElement) ((JavascriptExecutor) driver).executeScript(
                                   "return arguments[0].parentNode;", myElement);

XPath:

WebElement myElement = driver.findElement(By.id("myDiv"));
WebElement parent = myElement.findElement(By.xpath("./.."));

Obtaining the driver from the WebElement

Note: As you can see, for the JavaScript version you'll need the driver. If you don't have direct access to it, you can retrieve it from the WebElement using:

WebDriver driver = ((WrapsDriver) myElement).getWrappedDriver();

Little more about XPath axes

Lets say we have below HTML structure:

<div class="third_level_ancestor">
    <nav class="second_level_ancestor">
        <div class="parent">
            <span>Child</span>
        </div>
    </nav>
</div>

1. //span/parent::* - returns any element which is direct parent.

In this case output is <div class="parent">

2. //span/parent::div[@class="parent"] - returns parent element only of exact node type and only if specified predicate is True.

Output: <div class="parent">

3. //span/ancestor::* - returns all ancestors (including parent).

Output: <div class="parent">, <nav class="second_level_ancestor">, <div class="third_level_ancestor">...

4. //span/ancestor-or-self::* - returns all ancestors and current element itself.

Output: <span>Child</span>, <div class="parent">, <nav class="second_level_ancestor">, <div class="third_level_ancestor">...

5. //span/ancestor::div[2] - returns second ancestor (starting from parent) of type div.

Output: <div class="third_level_ancestor">

Let's consider your DOM as

<a>
    <!-- some other icons and texts -->
    <span>Close</span>
</a>

Now that you need to select parent tag 'a' based on <span> text, then use

driver.findElement(By.xpath("//a[.//span[text()='Close']]"));

Explanation: Select the node based on its child node's value

Take a look at the possible XPath axes, you are probably looking for parent. Depending on how you are finding the first element, you could just adjust the xpath for that.

Alternatively you can try the double-dot syntax, .. which selects the parent of the current node.