"None should write runes
Who can't read what he carves:
A mystery mistaken
Can bring men to misery..."

We are people built up from the experiences of many ages.

We have all occupied many chambers along the great halls of the infinite. Some of us even retain a gauzy memory of those older existences, fleeting images from chambers we occupied at some time in the past. Who we are now is an amalgam of those experiences, forged from raw energy by the alchemy of time.

Join me on a journey back to the days when great battles for power and property were being fought all across Northern Europe. A time when the Northmen ruled the seas in their longships. It was there, in that particular chamber of being, that I first met him. Even now, more than a thousand years later, I still remember him well.

His name was Egil...

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This is a 17th century depiction of what Egil looked like. But this is more like a caricature of the Egil I remember. He was much darker, much more fearsome in his carriage and his mannerisms. You could never see what really lay behind those black eyes. It was only through his words and his deeds that the real man emerged.

To my recollection, Egil stood apart from other men of his day, not only as a savage fighter and skilled sailor, but also as a man aware of his place in the universal continuum. He was larger than life, both physically and intellectually. Perhaps this is why many considered him to be a sorcerer. Although he was a skilled runecaster, he disdained sorcery. Such trickery was the handiwork of Loki, the Norse god of mischief, and counter to the will of the Allfather, Odin.

In many ways, Egil was a paradox: a sailor and a farmer, a lawyer and a murderer, a savage and a poet. As a runecutter he had no equal, as a general he had no peer, and as a fighter he had no mercy. He drank hard, fought hard, lived fast, and died old. He was given two great gifts from Odin: invincibility in battle, and the gift of skalding, or the making of verses.

It was through these verses that Egil hoped to keep his memory and the words of Odin alive across the ages. Near the end of his life, he wrote:

 

 

"Listen, land-owner,
And let your folks hear
The grave sea-growl
Of my God-granted verse:
The measured mead-brew
Mulled in your honor
Will be held high in Hordaland
As long as men harvest."

Alas, I am not as eloquent as Egil. My words alone will not be sufficient to tell you his story. Fortunately, there is another way. Join me in a journey of the mind, witness with me a movie of the imagination. I will provide the atmosphere and the story, and your own limitless imagination will show you Egil's saga.

You should have no trouble in creating the proper images in your mind. After all, you have quite possibly been there yourself...

The Story The Concept The Music
RUNES music, text, and related images Copyright © 1996, 2002 by Gary Poisson, All Rights Reserved.
For more information, contact the author at northlight@ameritech.net.