twilight of the gods
clash of arms: wolf, wyrm and fire
waters swallow world
By DJ Tyrer
Gamla
By David Edwards
Uppsala Runestone
carved left to right? right to left? –
secret whispers of
Bragi, god of poetry –
lays Asgard aflame.
Thor’s temper, Odin’s power,
and Freya’s beauty,
urged by shape-shifting Loki’s
deception and tricks,
burn that celestial wood.
Valkyries carry,
battlefield to Valhalla,
heroes and warriors
(“carrion fed to ravens”)
used up by heaven
in their uncounted millions
while through the ages
Norse gods, under royal mounds,
slumber forgotten.
Fires of Middle-earth
By Aeronwy Dafies
In twilit realms
Gods follow reavers’ trail
Clash of arms
Aesir blades never fail
Fires spread
Engulf Middle-earth, all the Tree
Blood flows
Drained from the veins of the free
Wolf moon
Eclipse of human domain
Gods fall
Middle-earth will never be the same
The Saga of the Gods of the North
By Harris Coverley
Across the North Sea came the Norseman’s gods
Lord Odin and the rest of the Æsir
To conquer with honour against all odds
Regardless of injury they would incur
An invasion of Britannia’s lands
And to crush its own fair gods into sand!
Gods Saxon and Celtic first did not see
For they continued to fight amongst themselves
Concerned not with that branch of Yggdrasil’s tree
‘Twas only when the enemy landed its elves
That Britannia’s gods came to coalition
United upon a common mission!
Belatucadros cut down brave Baldr
While Thor did burn Ialonus’s fields
Móði sheared Viridius’s alder
Mars Cnabetius smashed jötunn shields
And while blind Höðr was kept in the vague
Loki released amongst nicors a plague
Bear god Matunus mauled elf after elf
As Ankou stalked freely throughout the land
Wyrd could not predict the end herself
As gods and monsters brawled in roving bands
The common poor people’s calls unheeded
Famine came as the soil could not be seeded
The Britannic gods then brought out at last
What they thought to be their secret weapon:
Wōden—greatest fighter of recent past
How things were going he had to step in
He gathered his sword and chainmail of gold
The warrior idol—a sight to behold!
Odin and he finally clashed at Cross Fell
But on neither could mortal blow be dealth…
And yet the Norse god did see through the hell
That Wōden was in-fact but Odin himself!
All the gods then realised their terrible crime:
They were fighting themselves the entire time!
How the Aesir/Vanir War began
By Cardinal Cox
Loki said to the assembled Aesir
See there are the Vanir in their valley
See them dance? Hear the drums?
They jig with Golden Brew – Gullveig
A maiden of magical mien
Raid their ramshackle ranch
Steal her that you might enjoy her
So they rode and roamed and reached them
Where is the wondrous woman?
The raiders roughly requested
And the Vanir gave them
The flashing flask of reindeer water
Home again they poured her into a pan
Stuck in one of their ten hairy spears
Tasted her and saw their bright brother dead
So they flashed flint and struck fire
And they boiled the golden woman
Stuck in one of their ten spears bound with rings
Tasted her and saw giants breaking walls
So they boiled her a second time
Stuck in one of their ten splinter bladed spears
Tasted her and saw All Father devoured by worms
They boiled her a third time
Tasted her and called her Bright
Her sisters know her bringing trances
Revealing fates and fortunes and futures
Fair Vanir wanted weregilt for the theft
Intoxicated the Aesir stumbled forth
A battle against bushes and boulders
As much as their fearsome foes
Vanir gathered the vanquished gibbering gods
And put them in their sheepfold
Next day grey Odin swore
This seidh, this magic, is mighty
From now the bright one is my bride
No other Aesir may bed her
Even foster-brother Loki the necromancer
Is forbidden to fumblingly fornicate
With the wise woman of wishes
This began the Aesir/Vanir War
The Battle of Valhalla
By DS Davidson
Not a feast as intended
Swords drawn
Axes swung
Prideful gods take umbrage
Curses fly
Oaths made
Weapons drawn for battle
Immortal
Undying
Save for violent wounds
Clashing blades
Brutal blows
Battle begins in Valhalla
Overturn tables
Strike brethren
Sacred blood stains Odin’s hall
Thor’s hammer
Loki’s lies
Each sends gods to the slaughter
Meanwhile
Outside
Midgard and the Ash Tree tremble
View From Atlantis 