The Month the Almonds Bloom
now that he had come. The gloom vanished. It floated away like the rose-tipped mists of morning.
"Dreams are real, like sleep or quiet,
Or like love or flower-perfume.
Dreams ne'er die; they live forever.
Forever live the dreams of summer.
Winter comes but also summer.
Winter dreams still live in summer.
Summer dreams last all through winter.
Dreams ne'er die; they live forever."
As Lee Cheng sang, Woo Fung stood by the window and listened. Never before had he known such peace as at that moment. And as he listened to the voice of the little singer, he realized that his dream had come back once more to his garden. Hope rose within his breast. He sat down at his bench and commenced to carve a trinket of Jade and as he carved it seemed as though strange lights commenced to flicker throughout the bit of yellow Jade before him. It glowed and shone like a yellow diamond. It was the first time he had ever beheld Jade that glowed in the sunlight. In the garden, Lee Cheng still sang dreamily. What was the strange thing that was reflected in that bit of inanimate stone before him? It seemed to have life. Was it the song of Lee Cheng that had forced its way into the stone? Or was it love, the love which Woo Fung had for the Lady Shun Kao?
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