JULIAN OF NORWICH (lyrics by Sydney Carter)

Loud are the bells of Norwich and the people come and go. Here by the tower of Julian, I tell them what I know.

Ring out, bells of Norwich, and let the winter come and go All shell be well again, I know.

Love, like the yellow daffodil, is coming through the snow. Love, like the yellow daffodil, is Lord of all I know.

CHORUS

Ring for the yellow daffodil, the flower in the snow. Ring for the yellow daffodil, and tell them what I know.

CHORUS

All shall be well, I`m telling you, let the winter come and go All shall be well again, I know.

Loud are the bells of Norwich and the people come and go. Here by the tower of Julian, I tell them what I know.

CHORUS

All shall be well, I`m telling you, let the winter come and go All shall be well again, I know.

This was my favorite song to sing at my Quaker meeting as a child. When we would gather for 30+minutes before worship to sing together, I would always request this song. There were times that I remember my mother making me wait until other people had their chance to request something. There were other times when it was warm enough to sing on the back porch of the meeting. I remember waiting in anticipation for the daffodils and crocuses to come up in the spring. The first of the flowers, the flowers in the snow.

Last Sunday, on my way back from the Christian Peacemaker Teams board meetings, I stopped to visit my friend Julie who is an apprentice at the Stone Barn Center, a non-profit farm and education center in the Hudson River Valley. The center had been started by the Rockafellers as a dairy farm. It looks like a stone castle set on a hill and surrounded by beautiful greenhouses, day old lambs, and lots of busy working people.

My friend Julie told me that the snow had just melted that week. We could still see patches of it here and there and I was reminded of the snow banks still waiting for me back home in Boston. I snapped a quick picture of this crocus on my way out, humming to myself the Julian of Norwich song. "All shall be well, I'm telling you, let the winter come and go. All shall be well again, I know."