1 But therewith the sun rose upward and lightened all the earth,
2 And the light flashed up to the heavens from the rims of the glorious girth;
3 But they twain arose together, and with both her palms outspread,
4 And bathed in the light returning, she cried aloud and said:
5 “All hail, O Day and thy Sons, and thy kin of the coloured things!
6 Hail, following Night, and thy Daughter that leadeth thy wavering wings!
7 Look down With unangry eyes on us today alive,
8 And give us the hearts victorious, and the gain for which we strive!
9 All hail, ye Lords of God-home, and ye Queens of the House of Gold!
10 Hail, thou dear Earth that bearest, and thou Wealth of field and fold!
11 Give us, your noble children, the glory of wisdom and speech,
12 And the hearts and the hands of healing, and the mouths and hands that teach!”
13 Then they turned and were knit together; and oft and o’er again
14 They craved, and kissed rejoicing, and their hearts were full and fain.
15 Then Sigurd looketh upon her, and the words from his heart arise:
16 “Thou art the fairest of earth, and the wisest of the wise;
17 O who art thou that lovest? I am Sigurd, e’en as I told;
18 I have slain the Foe of the Gods, and gotten the Ancient Gold;
19 And great were the gain of thy love, and the gift of mine earthly days,
20 If we twain should never sunder as we wend on the changing ways.
21 O who art thou that lovest, thou fairest of all things born?
22 And what meanest thy sleep and thy slumber in the wilderness forlorn?”
23 She said: “I am one that loveth: I was born of the earthly folk,
24 But of old Allfather took me from the Kings and their wedding yoke:
25 And he called me the Victory-Wafter, and I went and came as he would,
26 And I chose the slain for his war-host, and the days were glorious and good,
27 Till the thoughts of my heart overcame me, and the pride of my wisdom and speech,
28 And I scorned the earth-folk’s Framer and the Lord of the world I must teach:
29 For the death-doomed I caught from the sword, and the fated life I slew,
30 And I deemed that my deeds were goodly, and that long I should do and undo.
31 But Allfather came against me and the God in his wrath arose;
32 And he cried: `Thou hast thought in thy folly that the Gods have friends and foes,
33 That they wake, and the world wends onward, that they sleep, and the world slips back,
34 That they laugh, and the world’s weal waxeth, that they frown and fashion the the wrack:
35 Thou hast cast up the curse against me; it shall fall aback on thine head;
36 Go back to the sons of repentance, with the children of sorrow wed!
37 For the Gods are great unholpen, and their grief is seldom seen,
38 And the wrong that they will and must be is soon as it had not been.’
39 “Yet I thought: `Shall I wed in the world, shall I gather grief on the earth?
40 Then the fearless heart shall I wed, and bring the best to birth,
41 And fashion such tales for the telling, that Earth shall be holpen at least,
42 If the Gods think scorn of its fairness, as they sit at the changeless feast.’
43 “Then somewhat smiled Allfather; and he spake: ‘So let it be!
44 The doom thereof abideth; the doom of me and thee.
45 Yet long shall the time pass over ere thy waking day be born:
46 Fare forth, and forget and be weary ‘neath the Sting of the Sleepful Thorn!’
47 ‘So I came to the head of Hindfell and the ruddy shields and white,
48 And the wall of the wildfire wavering around the isle of night;
49 And there the Sleep-thorn pierced me, and the slumber on me fell,
50 And the night of nameless sorrows that hath no tale to tell.
51 Now I am she that loveth; and the day is nigh at hand
52 When I, who have ridden the sea-realm and the regions of the land,
53 And dwelt in the measureless mountains and the forge of stormy days,
54 Shall dwell in the house of my fathers and the land of the people’s praise;
55 And there shall hand meet hand, and heart by heart shall beat,
56 And the lying-down shall be joyous, and the morn’s uprising sweet.
57 Lo now, I look on thine heart and behold of thine inmost will,
58 That thou of the days wouldst hearken that our portion shall fulfil;
59 But O, be wise of man-folk, and the hope of thine heart refrain!
60 As oft in the battle’s beginning ye vex the steed with the rein,
61 Lest at last in the latter ending, when the sword hath hushed the horn,
62 His limbs should be weary and fail, and his might be over-worn.
63 O be wise, lest thy love constrain me, and my vision wax o’er-clear,
64 And thou ask of the thing that thou shouldst not, and the thing that thou wouldst not hear.
65 Know thou, most mighty of men, that the Norns shall order all,
66 And yet without thine helping shall no whit of their will befall;
67 Be wise! ’tis a marvel of words, and a mock for the fool and the blind;
68 But I saw it writ in the heavens, and its fashioning there did I find:
69 And the night of the Norns and their slumber, and the tide when the world runs back,
70 And the way of the sun is tangled, it is wrought of the dastard’s lack.
71 But the day when the fair earth blossoms, and the sun is bright above,
72 Of the daring deeds is it fashioned and the eager hearts of love.
73 “Be wise, and cherish thine hope in the freshness of the days,
74 And scatter its seed from thine hand in the field of the people’s praise;
75 Then fair shall it fall in the furrow, and some the earth shall speed,
76 And the sons of men shall marvel at the blossom of the deed:
77 But some the earth shall speed not: nay rather, the wind of the heaven
78 Shall waft it away from thy longing–and a gift to the Gods hast thou given,
79 And a tree for the roof and the wall in the house of the hope that shall be,
80 Though it seemeth our very sorrow, and the grief of thee and me.
81 “Strive not with the fools of man-folk: for belike thou shalt overcome;
82 And what then is the gain of thine hunting when thou bearest the quarry home?
83 Or else shall the fool overcome thee, and what deed thereof shall grow?
84 Nay, strive with the wise man rather, and increase thy woe and his woe;
85 Yet thereof a gain hast thou gotten; and the half of thine heart hast thou won
86 If thou mayst prevail against him, and his deeds are the deeds thou hast done;
87 Yea, and if thou fall before him, in him shalt thou live again,
88 And thy deeds in his hand shall blossom, and his heart of thine heart shall be fain.
89 “When thou hearest the fool rejoicing, and he saith, ‘It is over and past,
90 And the wrong was better than right, and hate turns into love at the last,
91 And we strove for nothing at all, and the Gods are fallen asleep;
92 For so good is the world a-growing that the evil good shall reap:’
93 Then loosen thy sword in the scabbard and settle the helm on thine head,
94 For men betrayed are mighty, and great are the wrongfully dead.
95 “Wilt thou do the deed and repent it? thou hadst better never been born:
96 Wilt thou do the deed and exalt it? then thy fame shall be outworn:
97 Thou shalt do the deed and abide it, and sit on thy throne on high,
98 And look on today and tomorrow as those that never die.
99 “Love thou the Gods–and withstand them, lest thy fame should fail in the end,
100 And thou be but their thrall and their bondsman, who wert born for their very friend:
101 For few things from the Gods are hidden, and the hearts of men they know,
102 And how that none rejoiceth to quail and crouch alow.
103 “I have spoken the words, belov{`e}d, to thy matchless glory and worth;
104 But thy heart to my heart hath been speaking, though my tongue hath set it forth:
105 For I am she that loveth, and I know what thou wouldst teach
106 From the heart of thine unlearned wisdom, and I needs must speak thy speech.”
107 Then words were weary and silent, but oft and o’er again
108 They craved and kissed rejoicing, and their hearts were full and fain.
109 Then spake the Son of Sigmund: “Fairest, and most of worth,
110 Hast thou seen the ways of man-folk and the regions of the earth?
111 Then speak yet more of wisdom; for most meet meseems it is
112 That my soul to thy soul be shapen, and that I should know thy bliss.”
113 So she took his right hand meekly, nor any word would say,
114 Not e’en of love or praising, his longing to delay;
115 And they sat on the side of Hindfell, and their fain eyes looked and loved,
116 As she told of the hidden matters whereby the world is moved:
117 And she told of the framing of all things, and the houses of the heaven;
118 And she told of the star-worlds’ courses, and how the winds be driven;
119 And she told of the Norns and their names, and the fate that abideth the earth;
120 And she told of the ways of the King-folk in their anger and their mirth;
121 And she spoke of the love of women, and told of the flame that burns,
122 And the fall of mighty houses, and the friend that falters and turns,
123 And the lurking blinded vengeance, and the wrong that amendeth wrong,
124 And the hand that repenteth its stroke, and the grief that endureth for long:
125 And how man shall bear and forbear, and be master of all that is;
126 And how man shall measure it all, the wrath, and the grief, and the bliss.
127 “I saw the body of Wisdom, and of shifting guise was she wrought,
128 And I stretched out my hands to hold her, and a mote of the dust they caught;
129 And I prayed her to come for my teaching, and she came in the midnight dream–
130 And I woke and might not remember, nor betwixt her tangle deem:
131 She spake, and how might I hearken; I heard, and how might I know;
132 I knew, and how might I fashion, or her hidden glory show?
133 All things I have told thee of Wisdom are but fleeting images
134 Of her hosts that abide in the heavens, and her light that Allfather sees:
135 Yet wise is the sower that sows, and wise is the reaper that reaps,
136 And wise is the smith in his smiting, and wise is the warder that keeps:
137 And wise shalt thou be to deliver, and I shall be wise to desire;
138 –And lo, the tale that is told, and the sword and the wakening fire!
139 Lo now, I am she that loveth, and hark how Greyfell neighs,
140 And Fafnir’s Bed is gleaming, and green go the downward ways,
141 The road to the children of men and the deeds that thou shalt do
142 In the joy of thy life-days’ morning, when thine hope is fashioned anew.
143 Come now, O Bane of the Serpent, for now is the high-noon come,
144 And the sun hangeth over Hindfell and looks on the earth-folk’s home;
145 But the soul is so great within thee, and so glorious are thine eyes,
146 And me so love constraineth, and mine heart that was called the wise,
147 That we twain may see men’s dwellings and the house where we shall dwell,
148 And the place of our life’s beginning, where the tale shall be to tell.”
149 So they climb the burg of Hindfell, and hand in hand they fare,
150 Till all about and above them is nought but the sunlit air,
151 And there close they cling together rejoicing in their mirth;
152 For far away beneath them lie the kingdoms of the earth,
153 And the garths of men-folk’s dwellings and the streams that water them,
154 And the rich and plenteous acres, and the silver ocean’s hem,
155 And the woodland wastes and the mountains, and all that holdeth all;
156 The house and the ship and the island, the loom and the mine and the stall,
157 The beds of bane and healing, the crafts that slay and save,
158 The temple of God and the Doom-ring, the cradle and the grave.
159 Then spake the Victory-Wafter: “O King of the Earthly Age,
160 As a God thou beholdest the treasure and the joy of thine heritage,
161 And where on the wings of his hope is the spirit of Sigurd borne?
162 Yet I bid thee hover awhile as a lark alow on the corn;
163 Yet I bid thee look on the land ‘twixt the wood and the silver sea
164 In the bight of the swirling river, and the house that cherished me!
165 There dwelleth mine earthly sister and the king that she hath wed;
166 There morn by morn aforetime I woke on the golden bed;
167 There eve by eve I tarried mid the speech and the lays of kings;
168 There noon by noon I wandered and plucked the blossoming things;
169 The little land of Lymdale by the swirling river’s side,
170 Where Brynhild once was I called in the days ere my father died;
171 The little land of Lymdale ‘twixt the woodland and the sea,
172 Where on thee mine eyes shall brighten and thine eyes shall beam on me.”
173 “I shall seek thee there,” said Sigurd, “when the day-spring is begun,
174 Ere we wend the world together in the season of the sun.”
175 “I shall bide thee there,” said Brynhild, “till the fulness of the days,
176 And the time for the glory appointed, and the springing-tide of praise.”
177 From his hand then draweth Sigurd Andvari’s ancient Gold;
178 There is nought but the sky above them as the ring together they hold,
179 The shapen ancient token, that hath no change nor end,
180 No change, and no beginning, no flaw for God to mend:
181 Then Sigurd cries: “O Brynhild, now hearken while I swear,
182 That the sun shall die in the heavens and the day no more be fair,
183 If I seek not love in Lymdale and the house that fostered thee,
184 And the land where thou awakedst ‘twixt the woodland and the sea!”
185 And she cried: “O Sigurd, Sigurd, now hearken while I swear
186 That the day shall die for ever and the sun to blackness wear,
187 Ere I forget thee, Sigurd, as I lie ‘twixt wood and sea
188 In the little land of Lymdale and the house that fostered me!”
189 Then he set the ring on her finger and once, if ne’er again,
190 They kissed and clung together, and their hearts were full and fain.
191 So the day grew old about them and the joy of their desire,
192 And eve and the sunset came, and faint grew the sunset fire,
193 And the shadowless death of the day was sweet in the golden tide;
194 But the stars shone forth on the world, and the twilight changed and died;
195 And sure if the first of man-folk had been born to that starry night,
196 And had heard no tale of the sunrise, he had never longed for the light:
197 But Earth longed amidst her slumber, as ‘neath the night she lay,
198 And fresh and all abundant abode the deeds of Day.
William Morris (1834 – 1896)
From Universtiy of Toronto Libraries RPO