Red-rimm’d are his bucklers,
Betarr’d are his oars—
His sails are all bleach’d
With the sea-spray and showers.”
“Abroad will drink Yule,
The young king, and will try
To wake up, O maiden,
The wild game of Frey,
Of the warmth of the hearth
He weary is grown;
He loathes the close chamber
And cushions of down.
“Heard ye not the hard fight
Near Hafirsfirth beach,
’Twixt the king of high kindred
And Kotva the rich?
Sail’d ships from the East
Prepared for war stern;
Their dragon heads gaped,
Their gilded sides burn.
“They were fill’d with proud freemen
Well furnish’d with shields,
And the very best weapons
The western land yields;
Grimly the Baresarkers
Grinn’d, biting steel,—
Howl’d the wolf-heathens
War madness they feel.
“They moved ’gainst the monarch
Whose might makes them pine,
’Gainst the king—the Norse king—
Who keeps court at Utstein;
Flinch’d the king’s bark at first,
For they ply’d her right well—
There was hammering on helmets
Ere Haklangr fell.
“Left the land to the lad
With the locks long and full,
Rich Kotva, the lord,
Thick of neck, like the bull;
’Neath the thwarts themselves threw,
They who’d wounds, in despair,
Their heads to the keel
And their heels to the air.
“On their shoulders their shields,
Such as Swafni’s roof form,
Flinging swift as a fence
From the fierce stony storm;
The yeomen affrighted
From Hafirsfirth speed,
And arrived at their homes
They call hoarsely for mead.
“The slain strew the strand
To the very great joy
Of ourselves and of Odin,
The chief of one eye.”
Valkyrie.