Further Calls to Gods and Others

It has been over six months since I last presented some poetic calls to gods and others designed for ritual use. Today I present five more: calls to Freyr, Tyr, Heimdall, Jord, and Aegir. Like the previous calls, these are also two stanzas of ljóðaháttr each (with the stanza break removed as before).

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Thor’s Visit to Geirrod, Part 2

Concluding from last week, here are the final seven stazas of “Thor’s Visit to Geirrod.”

To cross Vimur
then ventured Thor;
the river raged,
rising in flood,
with Gialp astride,
Geirrod’s daughter.
Thor was struggling
but thew a stone.

Thor’s Visit to Geirrod, Part 1

Snorri presents a prose telling of this tale, and he also gives the passage from the Old Norse skaldic poem Þórsdrápa by Eilífr Guðrúnarson that tells the story as well. However, it is a fairly difficult skaldic poem, even when translated to English. (If you have Faulkes’ translation of Snorri’s Edda, you can find this tale on pages 81-86, or in chapter 18 of Skáldskaparmál in other editions.) Thus, a more accessible poetic rendition is needed.

My poem is in 14 stanzas of fornyrðislag, and is titled “Thor’s Visit to Geirrod.” The spellings have been anglicized throughout. I present the first half here today, and the second half will follow next Tuesday.

A warm welcome
I wish to have
for telling the tale
of a trip by Thor
to Geirrod’s garth
and the games in the hall;
the draught of dwarves
I draw for you now.

Absinthe: A Call to the Green Fairy

Like many previous poems on this blog, today’s poem was written for ritual use. However, it is for a ritual that my readers might not have expected me to address: La Louche, the traditional method of preparing absinthe. Now, absinthe fans have a poem they can use along with the usual absinthiana of fountain, glass, and spoon.