Odin's Farewell Poem by Daniel Brick
Odin's Farewell
Half-eyed, I see
even bright day
dimmed to thin dusk.
Time and tides
wind my life
around and around
the paths of fire,
the screen of rain.
I walk through water-splotches,
stumble over red rocks
under blue-sky glimmer.
Here is the Great Sea.
That much earth-craft I know.
Huge gray rocks jut from the Sea.
Morning mist pours over them.
A lone horse walks slowly
across the sands, toward me.
Years of fire unreeled
a wide slue of stars,
heavenly whorl I watched,
soon grew to worship...
In all weather I wait in wonder.
I hung forward
from the Great Ash Tree
from day-red to night-black.
I know the holy beginning-work.
The Great Ash Tree is a huge spear
driven through the hearts
of the three worlds.
I grabbed the runes myself.
Two ravens warn me daily,
my World's midnight will be
the work of fire and rain,
This is Wyrd, it cannot be stopped.
The runes only whisper.
How can that half-speech help?
How can I swell it to whole speech?
Beast against God,
each is doomed in strife.
All strength spent
Only love is left below
to build the worlds again.
Earthlings,
man and woman,
lift the fire from within.
version, The Ring of the Niebelungen, and finally, the Random House Dictionary, to track down English words which derive from the Northland. Whew! Such is the scholarship that goes into writing a mythological poem. Why do this if you are going to be accurate, truthful and thorough?
In Wagner's libretto, the King of the Gods and Lord of the Universe is
named Wodan (from which is derived Wednesday) , but the Giants are angry, jealous and long for a war of revenge. They get it, and both divine races is eliminated, the world has a clean slate to begin again, and human beings, the outsiders to the Cosmic War of Beast against God. This end of an era war is known as Ragnarok, and in Wagner's version, Gotterdammerung (Twilight of the Gods) . I know this northern mythology as well as Greco-Roman tradition. In The White Goddess, Robert Graves argued there is a deep identity between the two mythologies.
My title Odin's Farewell is accurate, but I meant it as a homage to one of the musical highlights of Wagner's Ring - Wotan's Farewell, which floods the listener/viewer with 20+ minutes of the most glorious, ecstatic music imaginable. Even as I type this, that music is playing in my head, and it ultimately renders words redundant. I
wrote this and several other related poems in the context of listening/viewing a DVD recording of the Ring. My goal is to get closer to the creativity and wonder of Wagner's music.
Your stupendous poem inspired me to peek a little further further in Wikipedia. How beautifully apt to pen a poem about Odin who is associated, among many other things such as battle, death, the runic alphabet, and interestingly the gallows, with 'poetry'. I can picture this one eyed, long bearded god with his cloak and broad hat manifesting alive in your poem. I got so caught up reading different interpretations in Wikipedia and became lost with the fascinating myriad of myth surrounding Odin. I returned to your poem and just decided to go with the magical feeling your poem gave me without trying to be intellectual (which I'm not) with my comment. Fascinating and beautifully penned.
Beautiful. You have captured and portrayed odin very well. This poem mesmerizes me. Thank you for sharing! ES
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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5/14/2024 10:14:59 AM # 1.0.0.1119
Gigantic - that is the impression from your poem and Wagner's farewell and Loge's call. Music is playing in my head also very often. But only once it was playing at gigantic speed as by itslef, usually it plays as the memory of records I've heard.