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Glad of War in Spring


by A. E. Coleman 

 

A cock perched between the eyes of an eagle

crows as the Sky Traveler buries his speech

between Freya’s thighs. He grips her hips.

She grips his wrists as forked red hair

moves like wildfire, devouring that amber

patch of Folkvang between a pair of pale cliffs.

Behind her, hair spreads across the bed

in tangled honey veins of sap that rise

with the spring up through the long trunk

of Yggdrasil. In its wood hides the shape

of First Man, back strong and arms lifted

in branches that reach for the sun’s blazing

wheel while sweat-stained leaves tremble

in the winds of heavy breathing.

Woodland sunflowers bud and bloom

at the base in a merry frenzy of dew damp

yellows while beneath them Earth wraps

around the World Tree’s thighs as it plunges

three roots deep into Creation, Wisdom

and Hel. Grey-hooded Norns dance

with albescent arms bare as they shuttle

the diaphanous weft of each man’s wyrð

ever forward, ever deeper, unstopping

into that still masked darkness beyond

all objection, fear, and bargain, ruthlessly

following the weighted warp of what may yet be.


Artist Information:

Author: A. E. Coleman

Instructor of Creative Writing

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