ICELANDIC VISION.
From the Poetic Edda. Tr. by Wright, St. Patrick’s Purgatory, p. 177.
In the Norni’s seat
sat I nine days;
thence I was carried on a horse;
the sun of the Gygiars
shone grimly
out of the apertures of the clouds.
Without and within
I seemed to go through all
the seven lower worlds;
above and below
sought I a better way,
where I might have a more agreeable journey.
I must relate
what I first saw,
when I was come into the places of torment;
scorched birds,
which were souls,
fled numerous as flies.
From the west saw I fly
the dragons of expectation,
and open the way of the fire-powerful;
they beat their wings,
so that everywhere it appeared to me
that earth and heaven burst.
The sun's hart
I saw go from the south,
him led two together:
his feet
stood on the ground,
and his horns touched heaven.
From the north saw I ride
the people's sons,
and they were seven together;
with full horns
they drunk the pure mead
from the fountain of heaven's lord.
The wind became quiet,
the waters ceased to flow;
then heard I a fearful sound:
for their husbands
shameless women
ground earth to food
Bloody stones
those dark women
dragged sorrowfully;
their bleeding hearts hung
out of their breasts,
weary with much grief.
Many men saw I
wounded go
in the ways strewed with hot Cinders;
their faces
seemed to me all to be
red with smoking blood.
Many men saw I
go on the ground
who had been unable to obtain the Lord’s meal;
heathen stars
stood over their heads,
painted with fearful characters.
Those men saw I,
who cherish much
envy at other’s fortune;
bloody runes
were on their breasts
marked painfully.
Men saw I there
many, without joy,
who all wandered pathless;
that he purchases for himself,
who of this world
is infatuated with the vices.
