Ragnarok - XI
#12 of Ragnarok
Having heard that there may be a way for him to return to the world of the living, Shane has rejected it. Yet with some regret, for he cannot rid himself of the memories of his life, nor can he entirely recall them. But during Varr's watch, he begins to dream.
I still feel like "The Sulfur Carrier" is a cool name, but in the years since coming up with it I've come to accept that I may be alone in that opinion.
Why yes, much of this poem is a reinterpretation of some elements of Norse mythology.
Somewhere it was after midnight, when
The long hours of the morning stretch ahead
Sideways, so that they wider grow and can
Contain more night and not take up more time.
Somewhere a boxer wandered in his dreams
Down streets abandoned, over bridges high,
Around cold cobbled courts whose names he knew
But could not summon up to say. He saw
A door ajar. Within he found a ring:
Ropes foursquare, empty stadium, dark lights.
No sound but his footstep did echo there
As he approached, and clambered through the ropes,
In dusty silence and cold déjà-vu,
Somewhere behind him, then, a voice called "Shane,"
But as he turned, there came a mighty blow
Full in his face. He jackknifed back, and gasped,
To find himself stretched prone on pine needles.
Shane sat up slowly, panting, and he looked
To tell his dream to Varr who kept the watch.
The warrior was not there. The witchfolk were
All vanished. Here the ground looked undisturbed
As had the scarlet leaves where first he woke.
The boxer thought himself alone, as he
Arose, but then a firefly drifted past
His bleary eyes, toward the tumbled scree
Where he the Soot had faced. There, other lights
Like bubbles on the surface of a stream
All hovered slowly toward a point behind
The screen of branches evergreen. Shane frowned,
Suspicious, but he swiftly followed where
The line of insect light did point him, up
The broken talus stairway. Though he saw
No surer footing and no firmer hold
Where he pushed upward than lay to the side
Scarce inches either way, yet on the path
The fireflies marked for him the stones moved not
And what he would have thought unscalable
He scaled. Shane pushed his way through trailing boughs
That itched his naked chest, and filled his nose
With heady scents of sap and Christmas. There
Upon a horn of rock upthrust like wave
Made stone immutable there stood a man
Hooded and cowled and cloaked, who fixed his face
Toward the basin of the plains below
Ignoring the fireflies that circled him.
"You proved your worth in battle thrice today,"
He said. Shane knew the voice, though he had heard
It only once, and not with waking ears,
"You were unstoppable in victory.
You were tight taciturn against half-truths.
You were indomitable past defeat,
And your first scars of this eternal war
You shall with honor wear. Now all my ranks
Are filled. Now all my phalanxes are full.
Now just in time my forces have a head,
Captain, superhero, and Champion.
You are the last who will beach on this shore
From waters deep darksome of mortal death
To taste immortal soldiery. No more
Will eyes blink clear the clamor of the field
To glimpse my autumn woods. No more will hearts
Stopped rollercoaster like from rage and joy
Learn beating in my lands a second time.
No more souls will come here, for if they did
They would find they had come too late." He turned.
He fixed Shane with his single eye. "So you
Above all others must not hesitate.
Forget the doubts that plague you. Bid goodbye
Your longing, your regret for those you left
Behind with mortal things in mortal lands.
I am no prophet. I know not your fate,
But well I know the fate of me and mine
Is in your hands. I do not ask you win:
It may be fate that both of us fall here.
I only ask that when you strike, strike hard
As does befit a man and hero, for
Only if you are both will we survive."
The old man turned again, and raised his hand,
Pointing like dowsing rod, down into the
Invisible night plain. "Behold your foe.
Behold the rotting-worm in oak tree's heart.
Behold the sinkhole at the cornerstone.
Behold the smoldering, swiftly smoking spark
Set underneath the forest eaves to swell
And sizzle till the hills are crowned with flame
And all that lived is ashes in the mud.
I know its name, but let it never be
That he who knows this name should give it tongue.
If I did speak it now, it would be here
And our tale would be ended. Call it by
Its actions, call it Sulfur Carrier.
Behold, Champion, that which you must slay."
Where the Old Man now pointed, like the prints
From copper etched by acid, stone, or steel,
Depicting ancient patriarchs, there grew
A point upon the distant prairie, like
A watchfire or a beacon. Then it spread
Like flames across the surface of spilt oil
First in a shape like sharkmouth, jagged, cruel,
And grinning like a slash-carved pumpkin ghost,
Then into the rough outline of a man:
Like those flat giants who in chalk downs sleep,
But hulking, simian, and nigh-awake.
The smoke of it surrounded them. Shane gagged
On stench of rotted eggs and gasoline.
It wrapped around him, like a fist, to pin
His arms against his sides. He could not see,
He could not smell, and all that he could feel
Was something in the fire groping for him
To smash his neck backward and break his spine,
To crush his brains against his skull, and rake
His slowly dying body over coals.
But ere he either broke or hit back, on
His shoulder came a touch. The Old Man's voice
Said "Shane the Champion, forget this not,"
And then he was awaking. It was morn.
He lay again upon pine needle drifts.
Across the embers, Varr lay sleeping, tired
From his share of the watch, and by Shane's head
The girl who had spoken to him, her hand
Upon his shoulder, saying, "Boxer, rise!
The sun is up, our way before us lies."