What Will We Do?

And the cup of gall was offered, and we drank, and called it sweet. The filth and fire fell down, and the temple-priests said, "nay", and we followed suit, and said, "nay". Our "aye" was "nay", and our "nay" was "aye". We drank the blood, we let our veins be emptied, we walked desouled across the concrete and smiled on command. We nodded as wolves became shepherds, we shook our heads at slaughter but said, "what can be done?", we came to savor the nutty flavor of poison and looked away from its bitter taste. We laughed because the laughter was gone, we partied because we lost the capacity to enjoy, we drugged and dreared and drove ourselves to weary narcosis.

And the world surpassed hyperbole, and outran awful any words which might follow and reach. The metaphors were ground to dust, the prophecies exhausted, the capacity to fully understand dwarfed and humiliated.

And no one raised a peep. Not a whine, not a whimper, not a stamping of the feet. The shields, long dusty, were kept upon their posts. The spears were snapped in two and thrown on heaps and burned. And all the while the wolves devoured. Devoured and Loki's poets sang of lustrous sheep. Wolves slaughtered, and the skalds of Lopt called it help. And the wolves tore limb from limb, and the serpent dripped deadly bile into the soil, and Laufeysson's song-smiths called it feast and broth ; and we bought it, and we bowed down, and we said, "yes", and we said it some more, for we were thralls, we were all thralls, we were all humiliated and self-humiliated, wanting to be duped and wanting to be drugged, thralls.

And we dared to call upon the Holy Names. We dared to ask why when all-surrounding suffering reared its head and bit us. We dared to think our passified, servile voices had any worth to reach celestial doers of deeds. And the one-eyed brow glowered and was stern. And the fist holding the mallet crackling with golden fire of clouds shook with rage. And the necklace-bearing beauty cried her tears for fallen Odr, as the foolish soul stayed round the hearth and would not journey out to rescue love. And all the lone warriors girded up their gear, and made ready, for the hour seemed very close indeed, and the fallen heroes had diminished to a trickle, while the fool's ship filled with wild-eyed dupes of idiocy.

And where were we? Where were our cries? Who raised the hue and cry? Who blew upon the trumpet? Who summoned all the warriors? Who said the time is now to take a stand? Who hollared raging growl into the shields? Who conjured up the wod from all the gloom and set the folk into the field to raise their shields against the monsters? Who dared to stake right and wisdom against lies bellowed loud from every post, poison cast free from every field, wolves let loose upon purported enemies who never touched our soil? Who dared to raise their voice for holy powers?

Yet they filthed upon the garments of those most-beloved spirits ; they drenched the bodies of their children in vile, insulting waste ; they stabbed and butchered and corroded, and what did we do? What did we do? What will we do?