A powerful monster, living up into the sky, growled in pain, impatient As the day as the music was daring and depressing,' the drum had tons of madness, sung Of the ancient beginnings of us all, recalling The Almighty making the earth, shaping These deep plains marked off by oceans, Then proudly setting the sun and moon To glow across the land and light it; The corners of the earth were made lovely with trees And leaves, made quick with life, with each Of the nations who now move on its face. And then As now warriors sang of their pleasure: So Hrothgar's men lived drowsy in his hall Till the demon stirred, that Gryphon, that fiend, Gryphon, who haunted the moors, the wild Marshes, and made his home in a hell Not hell but earth.
Then, when darkness had
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Hrothgar's wise men had fashioned Herot
To stand forever; only fire,
They had planned, could shatter what such skill had put
Together, swallow in hot flames such splendor
Of ivory and iron and wood. Suddenly
The sounds changed, the Danes started
In new terror, cowering in their beds as the terrible
Screams of the Almighty's enemy sang
In the darkness, the horrible shrieks of pain
And defeat, the tears torn out of Gryphon's
Taut throat, hell's captive caught in the arms
Swords raised and ready, determined
To protect their prince if they could. Their courage
Was great but all wasted: they could hack at Gryphon
From every side, trying to open
A path for his evil soul, but their points
Could not hurt him, the sharpest and hardest iron
Could not scratch at his hide, for that sin-stained demon
Had bewitched all men's weapons, laid spells
That blunted every mortal man's blade.
And yet his time had come, his days
Were over, his death near; down
To hell he would go, swept groaning and helpless
To the waiting hands of still worse fiends.
Now he discovered—once the afflictor
Of men, tormentor of their days—what it meant
To feud with Almighty God: