Tower of light,
as sun beneath the sea rising,
arms stretched out in dawn
shoreline yawns, she beams, and I,
upon the highest seat on granite crags
that all above the circling worlds does sit,
am stunned, with awe of brightness bound
within a sterile, barren wasteland. Ah!
If only I, who like her light, was once sore bound
within the lair of howling brutes, might free :
release that seething ovum-field so burgeon'd out
to barley-burst in green and gold upon the fields!
For I have caught her shy yet stern and stoutest eyes
beneath that deepest palace shining gold
beneath the green-blue waves where Gods take sip
of Aegir tribute-brewèd beer : but ne'er
before this moment dawning 'fore my eyes have I
been awed so deep with ripe so frozen buried!
Tears! O if these tears might drip as drops of rain
from antlers of Eikthyrnir, down,
to where her homeland, frozen-bound, is found,
then thaw, the ancient loin-runes of my wand, might work
such magic marvel-ripening as ne'er the eyes have seen!
Alas! But yet this rescue may not --- no, it is forbidden, sure!
Then why my eyes did rest upon her bosom beaming
cleaved beneath the ice-rimmed sea above? O why?
For I might rescue her entire, loose her gripped
by blue-cold hands! But as it stands, I rue,
bereft with sudden love forbid and foreign.