“Now the Green Blade Riseth” (a carol for Easter)

Getting together a reprint of J.F. Powers's novel Wheat That Springeth Green, we were struck by the beauty of its epigraph (which appears in the form of sheet music, taken from The Oxford Book of Carols). Digging a bit, it becomes clear that the carol is in fact an Easter song. Even so, it can be appreciated even by a non-believer on this early spring day.

Now the Green Blade Riseth Now the green blade riseth from the buried grain, Wheat that in dark earth many days has lain; love lives again, that with the dead has been: love is come again, like wheat that springeth green.

In the grave they laid him, love whom men had slain, thinking that never he would wake again, laid in the earth like grain that sleeps unseen: love is come again like wheat that springeth green.

Forth he came at Easter, like the risen grain, he that for three days in the grave had lain, quick from the dead my risen Lord is seen: love is come again, like wheat that springeth green.

When our hearts are wintry, grieving in pain, thy touch can call us back to life again, fields of hearts that dead and bare have been: love is come again, like wheat that springeth green.

—John M.C. Crum, 1928

[repost of a 2009 entry]