THE ROWAN CANTICLES - Canticle I - Canto IX - Journey North
A Tale Told in the Ancient Manner
The Rowan Canticles is an epic poem written in doggerel tetrameter. In other words, although each line contains eight syllables and rhymes with other lines nearby, like Shakespeare, I’ve used enjambment (one line spilling over into the next) here and there, especially in dialog sections. Mostly, though, I’ve striven for iambic tetrameter, which makes for a nice rhythm. You’ll notice that couplets, quatrains and other rhyme schemes refresh with each long Canticle. The old school language of The Rowan Canticles can be dense, but hey, it’s fun and it fits the fantasy.
Each week I will post a fresh Canto here at Substack, adding to the story. You’ll find ninety-nine Cantos in all contained in the three Canticles. The work is 13,000 lines long, about the length of Homer’s The Odyssey.
I hope you enjoy it!
Odds Bodkin
Don’t forget to download the companion Glossary below for definitions of archaic words to smooth your read!
CANTO IX
JOURNEY NORTH
"Comfort is a high king’s virtue,
Save when comfort's bliss can hurt you.
Then, girl, ‘tis folly to be soft,"
Harcto reflected, as he coughed.
"So quibble not upon my health.
Body is poor. ‘Tis thought that's wealth!"
Gudrunlod worried through her smiles.
His coughs had lengthened with the miles
And though to wrap him she took pains,
His coughs, like mushrooms, grew in rains.
Last night had dropped a chilling storm
Her skins and blankets could not warm.
Like fists, the winds had rent the tent.
Beneath the stakes a flood they'd sent
That numbed the knees and swelled the bones,
Unjerked the beef and soaked the scones.
"Our periapt useless will be
If fever blinds you at the sea
And you the grasses cannot find.
One can with courage, too, go blind,"
Gudrunlod urged, then snapped the reins.
Green counterpanes of fields and lanes,
Crisscrossed by birdlets chanting trills,
Lay like sargassum on the hills
Which rolled like waves, wind insistent,
T'ward a shore of mountains distant.
Warmed by the blue sky's drying sun,
And lulled by ox backs, tough and dun,
Swaying slowly in the traces,
Harcto dreamt of days and places
When his deep power’s Will had shone
And he that power's wealth had known,
When he the winds and waves had stilled
And Warog’s Norns had overwilled,
Of places tall, above the sea,
Of rare and able company,
Of ocean tempests pounding ships
And spell-saved crafts, safe in their slips.
For once, a Water Mage he'd been,
Pure bred, pure hearted, free of sin,
One of that blue-robed brotherhood
Who'd always done just what he should.
Patrician born, his ev'ry trait
Had led to magic's high estate.
Strong he’d been, and pure of spirit.
When pond sylphs sang, he could hear it.
When sea storms boiled beyond earth's curve,
He felt their force in ev'ry nerve.
Since long-lost days of history,
The Reach’s kings had bought the sea
With magics of the spirit realm
So each king’s captain, at his helm,
Might know full sails and currents kind,
And not in creeping fogs row blind.
Hence the Brotherhood of Mages––
Sundry scribes, soothsayers, sages.
Robed sea-blue, these magic makers
Ruled their Temple on the breakers,
Fulfilled the bidding of those kings
And culled the wealth that power brings.
Elite, austere, they lived removed
In halls held high by columns grooved,
Lying on the sheen of satin's furls
In beds bright with mosaic pearls.
But no loved ones shared their lone sleep.
Celibates’ lives they'd vowed to keep.
To hoard his seed, each one did swear
On Warog's gates, on sea and air––
Magic's conditions, carved in stone
On bedsteads where each slept alone.
A depth of days this law had forged,
The will of Demons, light-engorged,
Capricious Norns filled full with hates,
Held back from earth by Warog's Gates.
In penal dark, by love unwarmed,
The Norns of Warog roared and swarmed.
Yet, tethered to a Leash of Will
And cowed so not to burn and kill,
These evil beasts could currents sway
Whilst holding baleful winds at bay.
Symbols in liquid, deep immersed;
Long nights of chanting, well rehearsed;
Fates burning in the crucible;
Warog was thus reducible
To Magework in the columned halls
And Mages in their satin stalls.
But woe to him whose vow he’d break
And still the Leash of Will dared take,
For purity wound at its core.
Once lost, ‘tis gone forevermore.
Best not to take, yet doubt its strength,
A leash with Demons at its length.
"Sire, what mountains rise there yonder?"
Gudrunlod saw his eyes wander.
"Be they the dunes of which you spoke?"
She'd stopped the cart to tend the yoke.
A linchpeg on the brace was loose.
Besides, she'd found two legs of goose,
Unsullied by the rain and rot.
"If dreams were wine, you'd be a sot.
Come now, Father, no argument.
Yes, body's poor and yours is spent!
That's certain. Yet, feed it we must.
Without it, thought's gold is but rust.
Wish you so poor twice ‘round to be?
Ha! Ha! So there! Now, see that tree?
Look to be grasses dry and good,
As if on carpets that tree stood.
No mountains will we cross tonight.
The sun, it westers out of sight.
With dark, this day soon fails its fight.
I say we camp here for the night."
Old Harcto listened to his child
And watched her, how she winked and smiled.
How fast a woman she'd become
This past year. Like a ripened plum,
She'd swelled to fullness, dark and bright,
One clear place in his fading sight.
Continue to Canto X →
Still journeying north with Gudrunlod, Harcto remembers his past, one he’s kept secret from his daughter all her life. He recalls how before she was born, he, a celibate Water Mage, battled a demon of Warog and lost.
Thank you, Joseph. It's nice to know you are reading and enjoying it. Share it around if you like. I'll keep the Cantos coming. Odds
Ladies and gentlemen, it's Tyrsday, and that means it's Rowan Canticle time.
By the way, I recently read the oriignal Lay of Luthien by J.R.R. Tolkien and his lay has a similar structure to the canticle you are writing.
I found it amazingly easy to read.