Old English Anglo-Saxon poetry.

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Phonetician
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Jan 19, 2020 7:09 pm

Old English Anglo-Saxon poetry.

Post by Phonetician »

The Wanderer

“Often the lone-dweller awaits his own favor,
the Measurer’s mercy, though he must,
mind-caring, throughout the ocean’s way
stir the rime-chilled sea with his hands
for a long while, tread the tracks of exile—
the way of the world is ever an open book.”

So spoke the earth-stepper, mindful of miseries,
slaughter of the wrathful, crumbling of kinsmen:

“Often alone, every daybreak, I must
bewail my cares. There is now no one living
to whom I dare articulate my mind’s grasp.
I know as truth that it is a noble custom
for a man to enchain his spirit’s close,
to hold his hoarded coffer, think what he will.

“Nor can the weary mind withstand these outcomes,
nor can a troubled heart effect itself help.
Therefore those eager for glory will often
secure a sorrowing mind in their breast-coffer —
just as I must fasten in fetters my heart’s ken,
often wretched, deprived of my homeland,
far from freeborn kindred, since years ago
I gathered my gold-friend in earthen gloom,
and went forth from there abjected,
winter-anxious over the binding of waves,
hall-wretched, seeking a dispenser of treasure,
where I, far or near, could find him who
in the mead-hall might know of my kind,
or who wishes to comfort a friendless me,
accustomed as he is to joys.

“The experienced one knows how cruel
sorrow is as companion,
he who has few adored protectors—
the paths of the exile claim him,
not wound gold at all—
a frozen spirit-lock, not at all the fruits of the earth.
He remembers hall-retainers and treasure-taking,
how his gold-friend accustomed him
in his youth to feasting. Joy is all departed!

“Therefore he knows who must long forgo
the counsels of beloved lord,
when sleep and sorrow both together
constrain the miserable loner so often.
It seems to him in his mind that he embraces
and kisses his lord, and lays both hands and head
on his knee, just as he sometimes
in the days of yore delighted in the gift-throne.
Then he soon wakes up, a friendless man,
seeing before him the fallow waves,
the sea-birds bathing, fanning their feathers,
ice and snow falling down, mixed with hail.

“Then the hurt of the heart will be heavier,
painful after the beloved. Sorrow will be renewed.
Whenever the memory of kin pervades his mind,
he greets them joyfully, eagerly looking them up and down,
the companions of men—
they always swim away.
The spirits of seabirds do not bring many
familiar voices there. Cares will be renewed
for him who must very frequently send
his weary soul over the binding of the waves.

“Therefore I cannot wonder across this world
why my mind does not muster in the murk
when I ponder pervading all the lives of men,
how they suddenly abandoned their halls,
the proud young thanes. So this entire middle-earth
tumbles and falls every day —

“Therefore a man cannot become wise,
before he has earned his share of winters in this world.
A wise man ought to be patient,
nor too hot-hearted, nor too hasty of speech,
nor too weak a warrior, nor too foolhardy,
nor too fearful nor too fey, nor too coin-grasping,
nor ever too bold for boasting, before he knows readily.

“A stout-hearted warrior ought to wait,
when he makes a boast, until he readily knows
where the thoughts of his heart will veer.
A wise man ought to perceive how ghostly it will be
when all this world’s wealth stands wasted,
so now in various places throughout this middle-earth,
the walls stand, blown by the wind,
crushed by frost, the buildings snow-swept.
The winehalls molder, their wielder lies
deprived of joys, his peerage all perished,
proud by the wall. War destroyed some,
ferried along the forth-way, some a bird bore away
over the high sea, another the grey wolf
separated in death, another a teary-cheeked
warrior hid in an earthen cave.

“And so the Shaper of Men has laid this middle-earth to waste
until the ancient work of giants stood empty,
devoid of the revelry of their citizens.”

Then he wisely contemplates this wall-stead
and deeply thinks through this darkened existence,
aged in spirit, often remembering from afar
many war-slaughterings, and he speaks these words:

“Where has the horse gone? Where is the man? Where is the giver of treasure?
Where are the seats at the feast? Where are the joys of the hall?
Alas the bright goblet! Alas the mailed warrior!
Alas the pride of princes! How the space of years has passed —
it grows dark beneath the night-helm, as if it never was!

“It stands now in the track of the beloved multitude,
a wall wonderfully tall, mottled with serpents—
the force of ashen spears has seized its noblemen,
weapons greedy for slaughter, the well-known way of the world,
and the storms beat against these stony cliffs.
The tumbling snows bind up the earth,
the clash of winter, when the darkness comes.
The night-shadows grow dark, sent down from the north,
the ferocious hail-showers, in hatred of men.

All is misery-fraught in the realm of earth,
the work of fortune changes the world under the heavens.
Here wealth is loaned. Here friends are loaned.
Here man is loaned. Here family is loaned—
And this whole foundation of the earth wastes away!”

So spoke the wise man in his mind,
as he sat apart in secret consultation.

A good man who keeps his troth
ought never manifest his miseries
too quickly from his breast,
unless he knows his balm beforehand,
an earl practicing his courage.

It will be well for him who seeks the favor,
the comfort from our father in heaven,
where a fortress stands for us all.
Phonetician
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Jan 19, 2020 7:09 pm

Re: Old English Anglo-Saxon poetry.

Post by Phonetician »

The Seafarer

I can relate the reality, a song about myself—
go on about the going, how I in toilsome times
often endured desperate days.

Bitter breast-cares have I abided,
explored in a boat many sorrowful places,
the terrible tossing of waves —
where the narrow night-watch
often seized me at the stem of the ship
when it crashes upon the cliffs.

Oppressed by chills were my feet,
bound up by frost, with cold chains,
where these sorrows sighed
hot about the heart — hunger tearing within
the sea-wearied mind. He does not know this fact
who dwells most merrily on dry land—
how I, wretchedly sorrowful, lived a winter
on the ice-cold sea, upon the tracks of exile,
deprived of friendly kinsmen,
hung with rimy icicles. Hail flies in showers.

There I heard nothing except the thrumming sea,
the ice-cold waves. Sometimes the swan’s song
I kept to myself as diversion, the cry of the gannet
and the curlew’s voice for the laughter of men—
the seagull’s singing for the drinking of mead.
Storms beat the stony cliffs there, where the tern calls him
with icy feathers. Very often the eagle screeches
with wet feathers. No sheltering kinsfolk
could comfort this impoverished spirit.

Therefore he really doesn’t believe it—
he who owns the joys of life
and very little of the perilous paths, living in the cities,
proud and wine-flushed — how I must often
endure on the briny ways wearied.

Dusky shadows darken. It snowed from the north,
binding the earth in ice. Hail fell to the ground,
coldest of grains. Therefore they come crashing now,
the thoughts of my heart whether I should test out
the profound streams, the tossing of salty waves.
My mind’s desire reminds me at every moment,
my spirit to outventure, that I should seek
the homes of strange peoples far from here.

Therefore there is no man so proud-minded over this earth,
nor so assured in his graces, nor so brave in his youth,
nor so bold in his deeds, nor his lord so gracious to him
that he will never have some anxiety about his sea-voyaging—
about whatever the Lord wishes to do to him.

Neither is his thought with the harp, nor to the ring-taking,
nor to the joys in women, nor in the hopeful expectation in the world,
nor about anything else but the welling of waves—
he ever holds a longing, who strives out upon the streams.

The groves take on blossoms, beautifying the cities,
gardens grow more fair, the world hastens —
all these things make the hurrying heart mindful,
the soul to its travels, to him who so imagines
on the flood-ways, to travel far away.

Likewise the cuckoo admonishes him with a sorrowful song,
summer’s warden sings, pronouncing pain,
bitter in the breast-hoard. Men do not know this thing,
pleasure-wealthy people, what some experience
who venture widest on the ways of exiles.

Therefore now my mind departs outside its thought-locks,
my heart’s insides, with the ocean’s tide,
across the whale’s domain, departing broadly,
the corners of the earth —it comes again to me
gluttonous and greedy—the lone-wing keens,
whetting the heart without warning onto the deadly way,
across surface of the waters.

Therefore they are hotter for me, the joys of the Lord,
than this dead life, loaned on land. How could I ever believe
that earthly weal will stand on its own eternally?
Always one of three things in every case,
will occur to obscure matters before his time is through:
disease or old age or else the blade’s hatred
will usurp the life from the fated, hurrying from here.

Therefore, for every man, praise from the after-speakers
and the living shall be the best of eulogies
that he labors after before he must go his way,
performing it on earth against malice of enemies,
with brave deeds, opposed to the devil,
so that the children of men might acclaim him afterwards,
and his praise shall live ever among the angels,
forever and ever in the fruits of eternal existence,
joys among the majesties.

The days have departed, all the presumption
of earthly rule—there are no longer
the kings or kaisers or the gold-givers such as there were,
when they performed the greatest glories among them
and dwelt in the most sovereign reputation.
Crumbled are all these glories, their joys have departed.
The weaker abide and keep hold of the world,
brooking it by their busyness. The fruits are brought low.
The glory of the earth elders and withers,
as now do all men throughout middle-earth.
Old age overtakes him, blanching his face—
the greyhaired grieve. He knows his olden friend,
the noble child, was given up to the ground.

Nor can the flesh-home, when the life is lost,
swallow down sweetness, nor suffer sorrow,
nor stir its hands, nor think with its mind.
Although one’s brother may wish to strew the grave
with gold for his sibling, to bury beside the dead
many treasures that he would wish him to have—
That gold cannot comfort him, the soul filled with sins,
which he hid before now while he was alive,
from the terror of God —
Mighty is the fear of the Measurer, therefore the earth shall be changed—
he established the unrelenting ground,
the corners of the earth and over-heaven.
Foolish is he who dreads not the Lord, his death comes unexpected.
Blessed is he who lives humbly, his reward comes in heaven.
The Measurer endows the heart in him because he believes in its power.
Man must steer a strong mind, and hold it firmly,
assured among humanity, clean in his ways.

Every man must keep himself with moderation,
to those beloved and those he deadly hates,
even though he may wish them be filled with flames
or burned up upon a pyre,
his own confirmed friend. Outcomes are stronger—
the Measurer mightier still—than the thoughts of any man.

Let us consider where we should possess our home,
and then think about how we may come there again—
and then we should strive also
so that we may be allowed to do so,
into those eternal beatitudes—

There life pertains to the love of the Lord,
hope in heaven. Thanks be to the Holy One,
so that he may honor us, the Lord of Glory,
Eternal Master, for all time. Amen.
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