MINSTREL WEATHER 



other months she is careless of man's 

 sympathy. April, preoccupied, hastens 

 from crumbling furrow to meadows that 

 shout the coming of the green. Intense 

 and too eager for tenderness, she craves 

 no admiration. Quite without excuse, the 

 song sparrow sits on a wine-colored willow 

 twig and sings frantically. Anyone has 

 as good a reason for ecstasy as he merely 

 that the dumb struggle is ended and the 

 long suns have returned in splendor. 



Contemplative between their dark ex- 

 otic leaves, dogtooth violets fill the light- 

 necked hollows. Spring beauties open 

 warily at daybreak to show stamens of 

 deep rose. Where imperious amber waters 

 go foaming through the swamp, spend- 

 thrift gold of cowslips is swept down to 

 the rivers, and budded branches that 

 leaned too close above the ripple are shut 

 out from the sun world for a while. Mauve 

 and canary slippers are waiting for the 

 fairy queen where our wild orchid of the 

 North dangles them on remote knolls, but 

 they are usually found and borne off by 

 some one for whom they are in no way 

 suitable. Translucent young leaves glitter 

 beside the stream's path. Dandelion ro- 



[20] 



