A People
There rises from the throng of elders,
With ice-gray beard and shaggy mantle,
One-eyed, a raven on his shoulder,
And sword unsheathed, a wonder-man.
He motions to the bards—and sadly
They sing of their forgotten birthplace,
When midnight stareth on the tents.
He speaks—around the altar-stone
That, blood-smeared, stands beneath the oak-tree
He sets new images of gods
And stands himself as god among them.
Then groweth leaf-o'ershadowed Birka,[1]
Where amid oar-song viking vessels
Cut glad the waves. On yon high prow
Stands the dread fifty-winter sea-king
With captured bride and hails his home.
Soon speech as soft as festal raiment
Is woven, timed to gentler breathing.
Then holy bells ring, centuries hurry
Like shadow of clouds across the lands.
With ice-gray beard and shaggy mantle,
One-eyed, a raven on his shoulder,
And sword unsheathed, a wonder-man.
He motions to the bards—and sadly
They sing of their forgotten birthplace,
When midnight stareth on the tents.
He speaks—around the altar-stone
That, blood-smeared, stands beneath the oak-tree
He sets new images of gods
And stands himself as god among them.
Then groweth leaf-o'ershadowed Birka,[1]
Where amid oar-song viking vessels
Cut glad the waves. On yon high prow
Stands the dread fifty-winter sea-king
With captured bride and hails his home.
Soon speech as soft as festal raiment
Is woven, timed to gentler breathing.
Then holy bells ring, centuries hurry
Like shadow of clouds across the lands.
Now all grows still, as mournful-still
As when a limpid St. John's Eve
Sets heavenly glint on sound and bay;
But in the heart's deep secrecy
Dwells dread, when anxious lips are silent.
My people, though your hand be cold,
As when a limpid St. John's Eve
Sets heavenly glint on sound and bay;
But in the heart's deep secrecy
Dwells dread, when anxious lips are silent.
My people, though your hand be cold,
- ↑ Birka, or Birch Island, was a port of the Vikings near to where Stockholm now stands.
136
