The Ring-bolted Sword

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 "..Lay between us the ring-bolted sword

the sharp-edged iron as it lay before

when we two together lay in one bed

when we had the name of man and wife...

Much have I said. I would say more

if more time for speech were granted me

but my voice fails my wounds are throbbing

I said what was true and now must depart.."

~Sigurdarkvida in skamma, Poetic Edda

trans Carolyne Larrington

 

 

 

 

The Ring-bolted Sword

(a 55)

 

 You brought iron into our unquiet bed

when you saw I wasn't the mask you'd paid for.

On battlefields only the dead

sleep easy.

Now you're gone

but the death-chill won't leave

these nights where my dreams

grow hyenas and serpents.

What lies tangle

truth can only mutilate.

I say what is true

and depart.

 

 

 

September 2023

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

posted for Desperate Oracles at

desperate poets

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images via wikimedia commons shared by Creative Commons license, full attribution at links: 

Cultural History Museum Oslo. Norwegian Viking-Age Exhibition 12 The Broken Sword  from Vold, Hedmark, deliberately bent and destroyed before buried as grave gift, 10th c

X-ray of the reconstructed sword from the Viking boat burial at Ardnamurchan[scotland], by Pieta Greaves of AOC Archaeology {10th c.}