Classic Poem

PART II.

From harpings and sagas and mirth of the town
Great Gisli, the chieftain, strode merrily down,

His ruddy beard stretched in the loom of the wind,
His shade like a dusky god striding behind.

Gylfag, his true hound, to his heel glided near,
Sharp-fanged, lank and red as a blood-rusted spear

As crests of the green bergs flame white in the sky,
The town on its sharp hill shone brightly and high

In fiords roared the ice shields; below the dumb stroke
Of the Sun's red hammer rose blue mist like smoke.

It clung to the black pines and clung to the bay—
The galleys of Gisli grew ghosts of the day.

It followed the sharp wings of swans as they rose;
It fell to the wide jaws of swift riven floes;

It tamed the wild shriek of the eagle; grew dull
The cries, in its foldings, of osprey and gull.

“Arouse thee, bold wind,” shouted Gisli, “and drive
Floe and berg out to sea, as bees from a hive!

“Chase this woman-lipped haze at top of thy speed;
The soul with it cloys, as the tongue cloys with mead!

“Come, buckle thy sharp spear again to thy breast;
Thy galley hurl forth from the seas of the West!

“With the long, hissing oars beat loud the North Sea;
The sharp gaze of day give the eagles and me!

“No cunning mists shrouding the sea and the sky,
Or the brows of the great gods, bold wind, love I!

“As Gylfag, my hound, lays his fangs in the flank
Of a grey wolf, shadowy, leather-thewed, lank,

“Bold wind, chase the blue mist, thy prow in its hair!
Sun, speed thy keen shafts thro' the breast of the air!”