MINSTREL WEATHER $ CHAPTER 

 II. A WOODLAND VALENTINE $ 



)RCES astir in the deepest 

 roots grow restless beneath 

 the lock of frost. Bulbs try 

 the door. February's still- 

 ness is charged with a faint 

 anxiety, as if the powers of light, pressing 

 up from the earth's center and streaming 

 down from the stronger sun, had troubled 

 the buried seeds, who strive to answer 

 their liberator, so that the guarding mother 

 must whisper over and over, "Not yet, 

 not yet!" Better to stay behind the 

 frozen gate than to come too early up into 

 realms where the wolves of cold are still 

 aprowl. Wisely the snow places a white 

 17] 



