that is good indeed, since thou canst also slay wolves. But how sweet it would be for me to have thee making a stave before me now. Wouldst thou? I wot not, he said, laughing; but let me try. So he sat down and fell to conning his rhymes, while she stood looking on from across the water. At last he stood up and sang:
Now the grass groweth free,
And the lily's on lea,
And the April-tide green
Is full goodly beseen;
And far behind
Lies the winter blind,
And the lord of the Gale
Is shadowy pale;
And thou, linden be-blossomed, with bed of the worm
Comest forth from the dark house as spring from the storm.
O barm-cloth tree,
The light is in thee,
And as spring-tide shines
Through the lily lines,
So forth from thine heart
Through thy red lips apart
Came words and love
To wolf-bane's grove,
And the shaker of battle-board blesseth the Earth
For the love and the longing, kind craving and mirth.
May I forget
The grass spring-wet
And the quivering stem
On the brooklet's hem,
And the brake thrust up
And the saffron's cup,
Each fashioned thing
From the heart of Spring,
