our claws, O eagle, have turned to ice, our wings have molted.
Where are the azure seashores of our sun-shot Greece 795
where we both swam on seas and the world leapt on waves
like a red apple we each strove to seize and keep?
O Sun, now we’re both trapped in the snows here like bears!”
He spoke, the sun turned deathly pale and its eyes glazed
as huge white silent stars appeared and dripped like wax 800
in a mute wake all night on the dead shrouded earth.
“Now Mother Earth has died, her feet have turned to ice,”
the lone man murmured, and recalled his dream and crouched
without a word, like a strong beast caught in entangling snares.
When the light vanished, the maid chewed on a seal’s pelt 805
to soften and to sew it for her bridal dress;
she’d given her word, and now she stooped, awaiting the sun
to come in spring, when she might wed, if all went well.
She chewed with joy, laughed in her flowering thoughts, for all
things would go well, the sun would shine, the grass would spring, 810
and soon on the earth she’d spread her hairy wedding pelt.
The lone man’s mind beside her coiled like a dazed snake
and only three cares came and came again and fell
in smothering pall: to keep warm, to sleep well, to eat.
He mused: “Thus must the beasts live all their stifled lives, 815
thus must the trees wait for their water, manure, and sun—
ah, who can cut the thread to escape and to breathe free?”
Man’s fate here wore an ugly mask, an ugly doom,
for other small and deathless gods ruled in these snows:
the Seal, that greasy goddess with a boar’s mustache, 820
almighty Lady Fire who perched in the hot hearth,
and great King Sunless, that dark lord with frosted beard 822
who like a rutting roe-buck with vermilion horns
plows straight through every village, smashes down all doors,
but sometimes only tinkles like sweet distant bells. 825
Wrapped in his double bear-hides, the world-wanderer strove
quickly to stir once more his frozen mind with thoughts.
Meanwhile the old witch doctor bent by the fire and carved
a god weighed down with fat, his daughter’s precious dowry;
he stooped and carved all day and night, and his heart trembled, 830
for on his sorcerer’s shoulders lay the whole town’s cares:
all hungered, seals had now grown scarce, lamps spluttered low,
and all the fault was his, for not one of his spells
had brought them God in a seal’s shape to kill and eat.
Trembling, he turned to the lone man with a sad smile: 835
“Good Spirit, deadly fears are crushing the whole town,
our strongest hunters have all gone to hunt in Hades
and left us here defenseless while starvation prowls.
I sink in snow, I sing and strive to lure the seal,
I cry to the musk-elks, invite the reindeer sweetly, 840
I rush and beat the frost-filled air with my harpoon,
and though it once returned weighed down with meat, alas,
it falls to earth now, bloodless, and our race will perish!
Good Spirit, pity us all, gird yourself well with weapons
and rush out hunting on the ice, shout till the seals, 845
those buxom dames, come waddling out to fill our pots.
The Spirit’s in duty bound to feed its starving people!”
Then the old man fell silent, the stooped maid got tired
of chewing, her throat swelled, and in the filthy air
she longed for kisses and began to sing of spring: 850
“Mother, I’m weary now of chewing the seal’s pelt,
a sickness smothers my small breasts and makes them numb,
they swell in the wild night till I can’t bear their ache.
Mother, my limbs grow wild, my dress can’t hold me back,
I’m stifling, Mother, I’ll knock down our hut, I’ll flee! 855
A maid who smells her marriage has great strength, they say,
for spring comes when she calls, and the good sun appears;
she lays her small breasts on the snows, and with their warmth
the waters thaw and flow, the fish rush down the streams,
and she-bears lick their fur in stealth while their warm eyes, 860
glazed with delight, brim sweetly with white fuzzy cubs.”
As the maid sang, and the old mother with hoarse voice
kept time, the cracked and quivering voice of the old man
rose from the hearth behind the two, dulled with complaint:
“We fear the dreadful god, and our hearts break in two, 865
we yearn to beg him for a beast to save our souls,
stumble on snow and yell, but our own shouts return
whizzing about us like sharp stones and break our heads;
he only lets but incensed songs approach him now!
I’ve heard it said that men on other shores are bold 870
and dare address him face to face and ask for favors.
One day a bone-thin Negro fell on our white snows,
then shook his fists and shamefully roared at the cold sky:
‘Fool God, you’ve portioned all things wrong, you’ve lost your wits!
You’ve sent earth too much water—give us a little meat!’ 875
I heard and trembled, and thought the world’s roof would fall
because of mankind’s babbling mouth and shameless mind.”
The rock-rough murderer laughed and teased the old witch doctor:
“I’ve heard it said that on far isles, on azure shores,
the sun walks like a wealthy archon hand in hand 880
with earth, his lovely wife, clad in an emerald cloak;
God limps behind them like a beggar, knocks on doors,
and plays a thousand sleight-of-hands, a thousand tricks
to please their hearts a bit and earn a crust of bread,
but all the mortals laugh and cast him crumbs and slops— 885
such was the land that gave me birth, such my buffoons!”
The lone man laughed, then stretched his long legs toward the fire
and the witch doctor shivered and looked round in fear:
“Lock your mouth tight! What if he hears us? We’ll all die!
This whole white world is ruled by one god only: Fear! 890
We’ve neither faith nor love, O grandfather, only Fear;
we fear the earth, the sea, the sky, disease and pain,
we fear the dead and living, all the beasts we eat,
we fear our minds, our hearts, our memories and our dreams,
we fear all careless laughter, our wild myths, our songs! 895
The thick air round us is crammed full of evil ghosts
and everywhere in darkness their teeth, claws, and their horns gleam!”
When the witch doctor ceased, he shook to his heart’s core,
and the archer pitied deeply mankind’s fallen state,
how its great soul had shriveled, lost its brilliant hues 900
as though it, too, were but a rose plucked by the snows.
Quickly he tossed his head on high to scatter fear:
“Ahoy!” he roared abruptly, and seized the old man’s arms,
but as he opened his mouth wide to ease his heart,
the pelt-flap of the snow-hut moved, and there trooped in 905
the settlement’s stout elders wrapped in their fat hides.
They kissed the feet of the much-suffering man, and wailed;
their oil was dwindling fast, their hounds were growing fierce,
though hunters had roamed f
ar they’d seen not one moist snout
but only ghosts that leapt about them with hoarse jeers. 910
Last night a woman had gone mad from wretched hunger,
the dogs were getting rabid, evil was gathering head
and like a plague would spread to beasts and men, to gods!
“Good Spirit, pity the wretched town, go out to hunt,
the seals will spy you and come close for very shame.” 915
The suffering man spoke not because his heart was heavy,
and his great brow grew dark, without day’s dawning light,
for life now seemed to him a helpless ruthless game.
He seized a wizened spermless codger tight, who wailed
like a slain seal, and shouted in his deafened ear: 920
“Grandpap, you’ve lived unnumbered years in these cold snows
and now that your eyes brim with reindeer, seals, and stars,
I, the Great Spirit, want from you the entire truth:
Old Man, why were you born, what was your goal in life?”
The startled codger tossed his shriveled hands on high; 925
the mighty question rose in his mind for the first time,
his small eyes suddenly gleamed, and he yelled out: “To eat!”
Deep sadness struck the lone man, pity and high scorn;
life strove for generations in these wretched breasts
and met one virtue only in all the world: to eat! 930
The great seductive tempter wished to shout with joy:
“Sun, song, sea, God, a woman in your arms all night!”
but he kept silent, in pity for man’s dreary fate,
then spread his hands above the sickly heads and said:
“Once as I crossed a blazing desert, Death dashed on 935
ahead astride his mare, the burning sands, and laughed;
wherever he stopped, the earth was scorched and the wells dried.
And I ran on behind him fiercely, held my heart
like a small hogskin of cool water and spread my hand
and silently caressed the earth’s last gallant grass 940
that raised its pale but proud head high on Death’s frontiers.
‘Your health and joy, O comrade sentry’, I called proudly,
‘I, too, have come to die here or to be saved with you!’
Now on the edge of this abyss, earth’s frozen heel,
I find your snows are like those sands, your souls like grass, 945
and once again I spread my hands with love and shout:
Tour health and joy, O comrade sentry, we are well met!’
Forward, seize your harpoons, let’s rush to the great hunt,
it’s only just that the Spirit turn to flesh and feed mankind!”
The moonlight’s silver fringes hang down far as earth, 950
the pale mind hovers softly, drifting toward the moon,
and a most sad yet most sweet song, like a seal’s wail,
drifts up from our deep hearts and quivers above the snows.
Thus will the light shine downily, and thinly lick
the desolate and rugged earth when the sun shrinks 955
and flocks of stars browse on her snowfields unrestrained.
As the world-wanderer heard his heart in his warm hides,
it seemed to him like a sweet bell that drivers hang
on the lead-reindeer’s neck to help from getting lost.
He led his troop in the great hunt, and crunched on ice; 960
in the dull nacreous glow the snows loomed like huge beasts,
like frozen waddling seals, like pure-white elephants,
like snow-enmarbled dogs and hunters in long rows;
stars hung like brittle icicles, frost-spirits played
on the smooth snow-strewn stretches like bear cubs newborn; 965
the sea spread, crystalline and green, in a hushed calm;
sometimes a falling star burst mutely overhead
and the dogs barked, but soon the hunters pitched their camp,
hid in the snowbanks, held their breath, and longed for seals.
For hours the hunters crouched unmoving with eyes fixed 970
to spot the slight warm breath break through the ice when seals
poke up their whiskered snouts to get a breath of air,
but their feet froze like glue, their hands grew stiff and numb,
and though the old witch doctor’s spells rose high, they fell
on the snows, empty, and rang hollow in hungry hearts. 975
“O eyes of our dead parents, O almighty stars,
O Mother Moon who broods until they hatch in skies,
and you, O good fat spirits who command the seals,
O forebears, listen to our cries: we die of hunger!
We don’t dare speak to God of our great pain, 980
for he has never starved—how can he feel man’s pangs?
Forefathers, come, for you have all spit blood on earth,
pity our grandsons, choose a plump old man among you,
dress him with hides, weigh him with meat, then let him come
in a seal’s form on these cold snows to feed us now. 985
He will do well to come again to his own town
and plunge in his tribe’s entrails, then rise high in lamps,
that his great ancient race may once again take heart.”
As the witch doctor sang to allure the stars, he looked
stealthily round in starlight to spot azure smoke, 990
but no seal’s misted breath was seen, not a star fell.
Then in that endless silence, dead for countless years,
the old magician lost his wits and his brains flared;
a thousand stars poured through him, his forefathers swooped,
till he began to hurl his dread harpoon with force 995
and it sped back and seemed to drip with clotted blood
so that the old man shouted, frothing, and his thickened tears
suddenly turned to icedrops on his frozen cheeks.
“I’ve cast dread spells on hunger! Push on, friends, don’t fear!
The whole night waddles like fat seals crammed full of meat! 1000
Eat, for our great forefathers come weighed down with fat!”
He sang, then swiftly danced and brandished his harpoon;
the dark god of insanity beat on his loud drums,
the freezing archer shivered in the shrouding ice,
and all minds watched with fear for the great miracle. 1005
If only he could turn to seal, fall on harpoons
and feed the whole town with his entrails lined with lard!
For the first time he felt the body’s full delight
when as a sacred votive beast it feeds man’s soul,
but the seal-miracle, alas, was late in coming. 1010
He gazed on mute stars only now that swarmed like ants
and sometimes fell along the cheeks of night like tears
and sometimes gazed on man disdainfully and spurned him.
The hunters tried to allure the miracle in vain,
but in the stillness suddenly distant janglings burst 1015
as though a hundred sleds swept by with silver bells.
‘The blizzard!” all screamed, and ran pellmell to flee the blast,
rushed down the path they’d cut through snow, while at their backs
the bells swept like a roaring sea, and sharp snow-spears
swirled in a needling siphon as the hunters screamed 1020
and stumbled in their haste to escape the blinding blast;
the archer tagged at the tail-end and his soul strove
to hold tight to his startled mind and keep it calm.
Far off on islands of the blest, flat on her back,
the blue sea laughed with Master Sun, the vineyards smiled, 1025
the heat scorched all the fields, but a cool sea-wind blew
as gle
aners stretched in the sweet shade and their limbs smelled
of acrid must, their chests and armpits steamed with sweat.
When the grape harvest ended, the feast days would start,
their lord would fling his courtyards wide for man and maid 1030
to eat and drink with the gay god of curly locks.
Then all their toil would turn to smoke, mount to the sun
and play in wreathed rings within the wine’s dim dazzle
in the far-distant vine-clad islands of the blest.
Basil and marjoram, the sea’s strong summer winds, 1035
coquetting wagtail waves, islands that sailed through air,
and small sweet clouds of springtime with their changing shapes—
dear God, Odysseus felt his brains would burst with longing!
He sighed with sadness, then cast his eyes about in stealth:
perhaps that sun was but a sweet seductive dream, 1040
or were these shrouding snows here but a stifling nightmare?
The lean exhausted dogs barked as with burning eyes
they watched their wretched masters weeping by their hearths;
the mothers portioned the last fat among their children
as the stone lamps went out and the snow-huts grew dark 1045
and the old women, men, and children shrilled with fear:
“Light all the lamps, for the stag-elk with flaming eyes
will see the darkness and swoop down to eat us all!”
Then the old men grabbed the last fat with hardened heart
from even the infants’ lips to feed the failing lamps; 1050
they felt the lean stag-elk approach with stealthy steps,
knock on each door, and where it found a hut in darkness,
wedge its sharp horns tight in the walls to send them tumbling down.
The old witch doctor danced the dead to their ice graves,
then, wild with hunger, huddled round his frozen hearth, 1055
for he had seen that drunken god, who grabs men’s wits,
dance on the crackling snow with an insane delight.
One day, returning from his brother’s grave, he’d seen
God striding through the town lopping the roofs off homes,
followed by frenzied hags who broke in a wild dance 1060
then dug in snow and swallowed heavy chunks of ice
and yelled that earth, for love of them, had turned to seals.
He held God’s face tight in his mind, then grabbed a log, 1063
strove silently to wedge him firmly in the wood
with hands bound to his back, then plant him firm on earth 1065
that he might leap no shoulders to gnaw at a man’s brain. 1066