GRENDEL'S AUNT (an original poem) - Part 5

geke (70)in #poetry • 8 years ago

This metered ode is written by a faery poet named Brighid. She's a character in my novel, The Grim Girl's Gallowglass. In pre-Christian Irish mythology, Brigid (spelled differently) was a member of the Tuatha Dé Danann, a supernatural race. She was the goddess "whom poets adored." Brighid writes this poem, "Grendel's Aunt," over the course of the novel.

"Grendel's Aunt" follows a hero named Hymm who transacts a business deal with Dwenndis, aunt of the monster Grendel, from Beowulf.

Part 1 is located here.

Part 2 is located here.

Part 3 is located here.

Part 4 is located here.

And below are the next four stanzas:

Hymm seized this employee, and penciled him in
for the scheduled strike upon Mundt.
Then he said, “Once you get there, dispense with their fence.
You can eat who you meet, but you're never to scar
the skin of Sweet Cindy, my love, whom you'll know
by the palpable heart on her sleeve.

“After an hour I'll charge in with power
and slay you with perfidy's sword.
Pretend then to limp off and die in your den
while their men, now indebted for this noble deed
will pay me in silver, in gold, and in steed,
and Sweet Cindy will slacken that sleeve.”

Dwenndis applauded and verbally lauded
this generous, lucrative scourge.
“You'll stimulate, too, their economy's surge, and
they'll sing of your praises, the Krugmans and Keyneses
for many a century hence. And for me?
For my fee, I'll take 20 percent!”

When Grendel had slimeyed and slithered back home,
'round the slippery elm of his lair,
and Dwenndis descended in watery slue,
so our hero laid limbs on a yarrow-down bed.
Though aching for affluence, this (k)night he slept
still enveloped by hunger and debt.