Thor’s Son
Written by Robert E. Howard
Serpents prowl on the Afri-coast, doom on the Moorish town
And this is the song the steersman sings, as the dragon ships sweep down.
I followed Asgrin Snorrisson around the world and half way back.
Escaped the hate of Galjeron who sunk our ship off Skagarak.
I loaned my sword to Hrothgar then, his eyes were ice his heart was hard.
He fell with half his weapons men to our own kin in Miklegard.
And then for many a weary moon I labored at the galley’s oar
where men grow maddened by the rune of oar locks clacking evermore.
But I survived the reeking rack, the toil, the whips that burned and gashed.
The spiteful Greeks that scarred my back and trembled even as they lashed.
They sold me on an eastern bloc, in silver coin their price was paid.
They gird me with a chain and lock, I laughed and they were sore afraid.
I toiled beneath the olive trees until that night of hot desire
blew me a breath of open seas and filled my veins with curious fire.
Then I arose and broke my chains and laughed to know that I was free.
I battered out my masters brains and fled to gain the open sea.
Beneath a copper sun adrift I shunned the proa and the dhow
until I saw a sail uplift and saw and knew the dragon’s prow.
Oh, east of sand and sunlit gulf, your blood is thin your gods are few.
You could not break the northern wolf and now that wolf has turned on you.
The fires that light the coast of Spain fling shadows on the eastern strand.
Master your slave has come again with torch and axe in his red hand.
Serpents prowl on the Afri-coast, DEATH on the Moorish town
and this is the song the steersman sings, as the dragon ships sweep down.