The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Buchanan :: :: University of Virginia Library

So Balder knew what mystical delights,
What slumberous idleness and peace supreme
Belong to the immortal goddesses;
And not a goddess in those golden walks
But loved the human light in Balder's face.
At last there came a day (if day might come
Where suns sank never in the crystal sea)
When mighty Frea said, ‘The time is nigh
To say farewell—much yet remains to do,
A weary path to follow, ere thy seat
Among immortal creatures is secure.’
And Balder smiled, for of those shining groves
His soul was weary tho' he knew it not;—
Ev'n Freya's kiss was chiller on his cheek,
And Gefion's face seem'd less serenely fair,
And only Ydun still had power to soothe
His spirit with her weirdly-woven runes.
And Balder said, ‘O Mother, sweet it is
To dwell among the immortals in these bowers,
But to fare on is better, and I seem
Ev'n as a cloud whose feet may never rest,
But still must wander, and it knows not whither.’

And so from that fair valley silently
They pass'd, and up the mountain sides, and down
Thro' other prospects less divinely fair.

And from the valley they had left the face
Of Balder slowly faded like a star,
Forgotten, dwindled from the drowsy dream
Of those great slumberous-lidded goddesses.
From that bright realm's serene eternity
All forms that are not present fade away
Like shadows stealing o'er a summer stream.
Yea even Freya did forget his eyes,
And gazed straight out at the unchanging sea
Smiling all calm as if he had not been;
And only Ydun did remember him,
Writing his name upon the yellow sands
And weaving it all round with subtle runes.

. . . But far away beyond those secret realms,
Still northward, thro' the wastes where nothing lives,
The goddess guided Balder, till at last
Into their faces flash'd the polar fires;
So that the streams were purpled and the heights
Took deeper crimson gleams, and overhead
The stars were quench'd in amethyst and gold.
Then Frea pointed with her hand, and cried,
‘Behold the City of the Gods!’

447

They stood
Upon the verge of a vast Sea of Ice,
So rough, so sown with berg and drift, it seem'd
An ocean frozen in the midst of storm
Before the surge could break, the waves could fall.
Still was it 'neath the gleaming lights of heaven,
Silent and awful, sleeping with no stir,
In one vast gleam of crimson bright as blood
Cast on it from afar. For lo! beyond,
Rose Asgard, the great City of the Gods,
For ever burnt to ashes night by night
And dawn by dawn for evermore renew'd.
And mortals when they see from out their caves
The City crumbling with a thousand fires
Cry, ‘Lo, the Sunset!’—and when evermore
They mark it springing up miraculous
From its own ashes strewn beside the sea,
Cry, ‘Lo, the Sunrise!’ There, within its walls
The great gods strive in thickening fumes of fight,
Gathering together bloody ghosts of men;
And when the great towers tremble and the spires
Shoot earthward and the fiery ashes smoke,
The gods exult a little space, and wave
Their brands for all the vales of earth to see;
But when the ashes blacken, and the moon
Shines on the City's embers, silently
They creep into their starry tents and sleep,—
Till like a rose unfolding leaf by leaf,
The immortal City rises!

And behold!
There, far across the silent frozen Deep,
They saw the glimmer of the topmost towers,
Fading and changing in the lurid light
Of their own terrible consuming flame;
And shadows to and fro amid the gleam
Pass'd, smiting shadows, and from out the heavens
There came a far-off sound as of a sea.

Still onward, walking now with wearier feet
The ice of that great Ocean, they pursued
Their solitary way, and as they went.
With shadows ever lengthening to the south,
The City sank consuming, till its towers
Just touch'd with gold the red horizon fringe;
And in the darkening ether over it
A star sprang like a spirit clad in mail,
And sat without a sound upon its throne,
Down-gazing; and the empty heavens and air
Were troubled still with melancholy light,
Wherein the opening lamps of night were swung
Pure golden, twinkling without beams.

At last,
When of that City little more remain'd
Than splendour from its ashes fading slow,
They reach'd one mighty gateway crumbling down
Ev'n as a cloud that clings upon a crag,
And passing in they found the golden streets
All chill and desolate and strewn with shade;
For no' quick foot of any living thing,
Mortal or god, trod there; but all around
Grew silence, and the luminous eyes of stars.

Then Frea said, ‘Call now upon the Father!’

And Balder, standing bright and beautiful
Like to a marble column wrought with gold,
All kindled with the shadows of the fire,
Rose on the ashes of the City and cried,
‘Father!’ when glory grew about his brow,
And on his breast and arms the light was shed,
Staining their alabaster. So he stood,
Tall-statured, luminous, supremely fair,
Watch'd by the closing eyes of all the world.
And suddenly, in answer to his cry,
A fierce aurora of pale faces flash'd
Out of the night of the extremest north.

And Frea cried aloud, ‘Almighty gods!
Behold your brother Balder! Father in Heaven,
Behold thy Son!’

From out the north there came
A murmur, and across the skies there swept
A trouble as of wildly waving hands.

Then Frea cried to Balder, ‘Call again!’

448

And Balder, shining still most beautiful,
And stretching out his arms to the black north,
Cried ‘Father!’

Suddenly the stars were quench'd,
And heavy as a curtain fell the night.