What know I
Of the will of the bow that speeds me on high?
What doth the shrill bow
Of the hand on its singing soul-string know?
Flame-swift speed I—
And the dove and the eagle shriek out and die;
Whence comes my sharp zest
For the heart of the quarry? the Gods know best.
Deep pierc'd the red gaze of the eagle—
The breast of a cygnet below him;
Beneath his dun wing from the eastward
Shrill-chaunted the long shaft of Gisli!
Beneath his dun wing from the westward
Shook a shaft that laugh'd in its biting—
Met in the fierce breast of the eagle
The arrows of Gisli and Brynhild!
* * * * *
PART IV:
A ghost along the Hell-way sped,
The Hell-shoes shod his misty tread;
A phantom hound beside him sped.
Beneath the spandrils of the Way,
World's roll'd to-night—from night to day;
In space's ocean Suns were spray.
Group'd world's, eternal eagles, flew;
Swift comets fell like noiseless dew,
Young earths slow budded in the blue.
The waves of space inscrutable,
With awful pulses rose and fell—
Silent and godly—terrible.