|
Odens Korpgalder The Lay of Odin's Ravens From Part II: Translated Lays and Stories in The Masks of Odin Translated by Elsa Britta Tichennell Introduction Back to Source Texts Index |
|
1 Allfather acts, elves discern, Vaner know, norns point the way. Trolls nourish, aeons give birth, Thurses wait, Valkyries yearn. 2 The Aesir suffered grim forebodings, Seers mistook the fruit-maid's runes. 2 Urd's mead she guarded but could not defend it From the insistence of the great host.
Hugin soars high to seek her out. The Aesir are anxious if he delays; To Longing-for-life 3 dreams become suffering; Dim dreams surfeit the dead.
Dwarfs grow numb; their powers fall; Worlds into Ginnung's waning sink; 4 The Allwise fells beings often, And again reassembles the fallen.
No longer stand fast the earth or the sun; The stream of destruction stays no more aloft; Hidden deep in Mimer's well Lies all wisdom. Know you as yet or what?
Dwells in the dells the knowing maiden, 5 Fallen from Yggdrasil down, from the ash; The elves named her Idun; she is the oldest Of Ivalde's younger brood.
Unhappy she seemed over this misfortune, Lying captive under the lofty tree. She liked it not with the daughter of Night, Accustomed to having worlds for her dwelling.
The victory gods saw the sorrow of Nanna 6; They sent her in Hel's house a wolf-disguise; She put it on and changed disposition; Confused with illusion, altered appearance.
Odin selected the watcher of Bäfrast 7 To ask of the dead sun's sorrowing widow All that she knew of the fate of the world. Brage and Lopt bore the testimony. 8
Incantations they chanted, they rode on wolves, The ruler and powers, to the ends of the world. Odin, listening from Lidskjalf, 9 Lets them journey far and wide.
Wise Heimdal asked if the mead-provider Knew of the origin, age, and the end Of the races of gods and her companions, Of heaven, the void, and the earth.
Naught would she say, not a word would she utter In response to the askers, nor discourse with them; Her tears fell fast from her brain's shields; Her power was numbed, exhausted, and dead.
Filled with sorrow Jorun appeared 10 Before the gods, unable to speak; The more they asked, the less she said; All their words flowed in vain.
Foremost at the questing was Heimdal, the watcher Of the horn of the father of hosts; He brought with him Loki, the one born of Nál, While Brage, the bard, stood guard.
The warriors of Odin attained to the Winehall, Brought to the place by the sons of the past; There entered Ygg's heroes to salute the Aesir, And share in the feasting on mead.
They wished Hangatyr 11 health and contentment, With well-being ever to brew his ale; The drinkers were blissful to joy at the tankard, Eager to feast with the Ever-young.
Each benched by Odin, the rulers together Eat and are sated with Sarimner; 12 With the ladle of Nikar 13 Skogul at the tables Serves mead in the horns of memory.
At the feast much was asked by the gods of Heimdal, By the goddesses of Loki. All day long until darkness fell They sought the seeress' wisdom and prophecy.
Ill they thought was resolved This matter, and little commendable. Cunning was needed to elicit An answer from the sly witch.
Darkening, Odin speaks. All listen: "Night shall be used for renewal of counsel; Each one who can shall by the morrow Find some solution for the Aesir's weal."
At the mountains' rim round the wintry earth The offspring of Fenris, exhausted, fell. The gods left the feast, saluting Ropt 14 And Frigg, at the departure of the steed of night.
Soon from the cast, out of icicle-waves, Comes the thorn of sleep to the frozen giant, Whose minions are slain in beautiful Midgard Every night at the midnight hour.
Then wanes the power. Hands grow numb. A swoon assails the white sword-Ase; 15 Unconsciousness reigns on the midnight breath; Thought fails in tired beings.
But the son of the Dawn spurs on his charger, Caparisoned gaily in precious gems. Over Manhome flows radiance from the steed's mane; He draws in the chariot Dvalin's toy. 16
At the nourishing earth's northern horse-door, Neath the noble ash-tree's farthest root, Went to their lairs hags and giants, Spooks, and dwarfs, and the black elves.
Up rose the gods. Forth shone the sun. Northward to Niflheim night drew away; Heimdal once more sprang up upon Bafrast, Mighty clarion-blower on the mountains of heaven. ____________________________________________________
Theosophical University Press Post Office Bin C Pasadena, CA 91109 1985 First Edition Harback ISBN 0-911500-72-3 Softback ISBN 0-911500-73-1 Buy this book. Back to Top _____________________________________________ Introduction This lay suggests the aftermath following the death of a planet. It has been omitted from many translations as as scholars, led by the eminent Sophus Bugge, have tended to ignore it as being quite incomprehensible. It is a lay of great beatuy, with a strong mystical appeal. as the reader senses the unsaid, dreamlike, all but unimaginable hiatus between periods of life when the planetary soul is immersed in the quiescence following death. Every kingdom of nature is held in breathless suspension, unmoving, unawarer, unliving, awaiting the electrifying urges of a new dawn. Allfather alone is active. In all the Edda there is no more poignant piece of music than this stilling of the pulse oflife, leaving each group of beings fixed in its own characteristic state of awareness for the long rest until the gods return. Odin's two ravens, Hugin and Munin (mind and memory), "daily fly over the battle field earth" 1 and report back to Allfather by night... So it is that at the end of a "day" of life, Hugin returns to Odin bringing tidings of the manifest world and rejoining the divinity whence it originally flew. Its companion, Munin, is the container of all hte record of events since the beginning of time. It is on the report of Munin that is built all attatinment, as memory remains eternally as the foundation of future awareness. Back to Top ___________________________________________________
2. The planetary equivalent of Bargalmer, the "fruit giant." 3.
What the Buddhists call tanha, thirst for life. It characterizes the
lower elements which are drawn to matter.
Back to Top Return to Source Texts Index Woden's Harrow Home  |