The Circle of the World

But the queen had long since been suffering from love’s deadly wound, feeding it with her blood and being consumed by its hidden fire. […] The towers she was building ceased to rise. (Aeneid IV, tr. West 2003)

When the witch’s corpse,
Husband held in static sway,
Was shifted,
And out of swollen skin
The enchantment was revealed,
With worms and adders
And her poison magic
Pouring forth,
The King was moved
To life before this truth.
The Devil’s work
Now shown to be
The font of his neglect,
Prime mover to his love.

But the Queen
The truth did not set free,
However much she knew
That a god had caused
The ancient flame
To burn once more,
Her love-forged oath to break.
The neglected towers
Of her kingdom,
Sterile as her marriage,
Stopped.
And madness moved to death
As deadly flames consumed
From within, her flesh.

Magic took the man,
But could not break the king.
Yet gods rot mortal crowns
Beginning from within.

Are gods and devils,
Ordained fate,
Essence of all love?
Or is love, love when
Trickery conceives it?
It is easy
To denounce one’s otium
When the image
Of one’s love is gone.
But illusion consumes us,
Conquers all,
And truth and ash are one.

and the king betrothed himself to Snæfríðr and married her and loved her so madly that his kingdom and all his duties he then neglected.
(Heimskringla, tr. Finlay and Faulkes 2011)

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