Love is a usurious plant, whose sun never goes down; a romance sweetens the mood as May dew sweetens the blood.

Constant friendship is one which takes the pleasure with the pain, the thorn with the rose.  The last comparisons shew more thought, and still more is seen in the beginning of the poem, Riwalin and Blancheflur, which has a charming description of Spring.

  Now the festival was agreed upon and arranged
  For the four flowering weeks
  When sweet May attracts, till he flies off again. 
  At Tinkapol upon a green plain
  High up on a wonderful meadow with spring colour
  Such as no eye has seen before or since.  Soft sweet May
  Had dressed it with his own charming extravagance. 
  There were little wood birds, a joy to the ear,
  Flowers and grass and green plants and summer meads
  That were a delight to eye and heart. 
  One found there whatever one would, whatever May should bring—­
  Shade from the sun, limes by the brook,
  A gentle breeze which brought the prattle
  Of Mark’s court people.  May’s friend, the green turf,
  Had made herself a charming costume of flowers,
  In which she shone back at the guests with a festival of her own;
  The blossoming trees smiled so sweetly at every one,
  That heart and mind smiled back again. 
  The pure notes of the birds, blessed and beautiful,
  Touched heart and senses, filling hill and dale with joy. 
  The dear nightingale,
  Sweet bird, may it ever be blessed! 
  Sang so lustily upon the bough
  That many a heart was filled with joy and good humour. 
  There the company pitched itself
  With great delight on the green grass. 
  The limes gave enough shade,
  And many covered their tent roofs with green boughs.

There is a heartfelt ring in this.  We see that even this early period of German mediaeval poetry was not entirely lacking in clear voices to sing of Nature with real sympathy.

The description of the Minne grotto is famous, with its magical accessories, its limes and other trees, birds, songs, and flowers, so that ‘eye and ear alike found solace’; but the romantic love episode, interwoven as it is by the poet with the life of Nature, is more interesting for our purpose.

They had a court, they had a council which brought them nought but joy.  Their courtiers were the green trees, the shade and the sunlight, the streamlet and the spring; flowers, grass, leaf, and blossom, which refreshed their eyes.  Their service was the song of the birds, the little brown nightingales, the throstlets and the merles and other wood birds.  The siskin and the ringdove vied with each other to do them pleasure, all day long their music rejoiced ear and soul.  Their love was their high feast....  The man was with the woman, and the woman with the man; they had the fellowship they most desired, and were where they fain would be....