Page:Anglo-Saxon Riddles of the Exeter Book (1963).djvu/31

 ''until from confinement     upwards I thrust, even as He commands     who laid at the beginning my fetters upon me. I can never be free from the power that points    the path I follow.''

Sometimes from above   I rouse the surges, stir up the waters     and drive to the shore the flint-gray flood. Foaming the waves fight with the wall. Dim stands up the dune over the deep;    dark behind it blended with the sea     comes another surge. Together they meet    by the sea-mark there by the high ridges. Loud is the wooden ship, the noise of the sailors. Calmly await the steep stone cliffs    the battle of waters, the clashing waves,     when high the violence crowds on the headlands. There must the keel find bitter battle,    if the sea lifts it with all its men     in that terrible hour; till out of control,     robbed of its life, it rides through the foam     on the back of the waves. Then will be panic there,    manifest to mortals;. . . . .    but I must obey, strong on my fierce way. Who will still that?

In this last there may be an echo of Matt. 8:24–27 (Christ calming the waves), and in the shipwreck picture a notion of divine retribution at the Last Judgment.

''Sometimes I rush    through the wan wet clouds that ride on my back,     scatter them wide with their streaming water. Sometimes I allow them to glide together. Great is the din, ''