Songs and Poems

1. Ode to Hule and the Twelve Companions
composed by Janarc

Ode to Hule and the Twelve Companions

Sing to me of Hule, brothers
Sing to me of his hammer, which raised
Our hall from nothing.

Sing to me of Hule the Warrior
House-father and troll-slayer
Sing to me of the twelve heroes
Sing to me of grief.

Hule the Burden-carrier,
Elf-friend, generous, fair,
his mighty builder’s hammer
the mortar of any battle-line

His brothers and cousins
His sons and his nephews
The twelve, the fearless twelve,
Sing to me of their love.

Sing to me of the Elves,
Angrod Hule-Friend’s Elves,
And the Foe from the north.
Sing to me of biting winter.

Red-snow nights and the frost
Forever biting into their beards
The twelve, uncomplaining, always
Close behind House-Father,
Whose fiery heart beat away the cold.

They sleep their days among the Elves
Water is their mead, and always the Foe
Lurks, until even Angrod hangs his head
Only Hule, Hope-giver, continues to sing
At the campfire of his brethren.

Night by night the Foe creeps forward,
Night by night, hope is stolen away
And the twelve weep as the clouds
Eat away at the moon.

NightBy night, Hule, Courage-giver,
Makes his hammer sing like wind
Over the ice-drenched mountains.
It is the last night of despair. Mighty
Angrod calls an end to stepping backward,
And the Elvish smiles cause even the Foe
To shiver and step back. And then the fight begins.

Too many. Too many. They forced us back,
Elf and man, step by bloody step, as though
A cliff were at our backs. Alone among men
And elves, Hule Orcbane sings of home
and of stonework, and takes no step back.

Back. Step by red-snow step. Where is Hule?
Where is Hule? House-father is swallowed.
House-father is consumed still singing,
Consumed whole by the cowardly foe,
There and then gone, honoring his word to mighty
Angrod. Not a single step back.

Consumed by grief, consumed with love,
The Twelve spit in the eye of the foe and drive forward,
Spears shivered, axes broken, shields stove in,
They hurl themselves with tooth and nail,
A spearhead of men, driven deep, until
They straddle beloved House-father’s body.

Damn the Foe. No orc defiles Hule Home-Builder.
One by one, the twelve fall, mighty men made
Mightier by his example. Angrod himself,
Generous Angrod, weeps for his friend,
Leads his children into the sea of scum,
wipes it clean.

O for Hule, who died first and bravest,
O for the twelve, the finest of our kin,
Whose honor it was to weep for
House-father, to die feet astraddle his body,
To be borne home by Angrod’s sons,
behind Hule House-Father,
Stone-handed Builder, who Angrod
Wept for most of all among men.