THE ROWAN CANTICLES - Canto XII - Buried Gold
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 XII
BURIED GOLD
“Beware the bluebells, so they say.
Avoid the dells where faeries play.
When withes bristle, death lurks near.
Where three ways meet, portents appear.
An oak's roots probe deep as its height.
A pond sylph's kiss soon turns to bite.
At man's last breath, spirit will flee.
Thou shalt not harm a Rowan tree.
What tell wives’ tales of stolen gold?
Of looted loot? Is that one told?"
Devlin conjectured as he bent
And through his mind directions went:
“To the crossroads, east through the dells,
Then past the oak where grow bluebells.
Past the pond’s black mussel midden.
Ten steps west, there gold is hidden.”
The pit he filled with stones and soil,
Then rolled a log and ceased his toil.
“This place I shall remember well.
Please guard it, faeries of the dell.
Oaks, leaf this place to leave no trace,
And let no Rowans take your place."
Then, rising, Devlin turned to leave,
But glimpsed some purple past his sleeve.
There reared a Crone's Head on its stem,
Cupping a droplet’s nectar gem.
“Perhaps if this thing I remove,”
He thought, “Gudrunlod will approve.”
Long leagues he rode, hard to the north,
Until the mighty sea came forth
And licked the old earth’s distant rim
With salt and thunder, wooing him.
Upon his horse, the prince stopped there
And breathed the laden, rushing air.
Continue to Canto XIII →
Now in the sea town of Peloon, Devlin is bloodied in a tavern fight.
On the seventh day did I shelve
Other books to listen to: canticle twelve.
Of how treasure buried in the Dell
Guarded by the fairies very well.
And of the old crone's head he did take
as a gift to Gudrunlod the Great.