Beowulf and Baba Yaga

And so Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, king of the Geats, breaker of meadbenches,
Ruled with wisdom, courage, cunning and compassion for a hundred long years
And at the close of his century, he was as young and mighty as at its advent.
Not a day did he age; not a single wrinkle creased or blemished his timeless frame;
And though he had braved many fearsome foes,
Foul spawn of forsaken Cain,
Not a single wound, no wicked scar,
No grievous injury could testify to his heroic exploits.
Men and women were born and died as he took a swig of mead:
The years of men were the days of the champion of the Lord.
And so, ever youthful in body, the great ring-giver was a good leader to his people.
But even as he awoke each morning with the exuberance of the young man,
Still exultant from his first kill,
Of some fierce boar, or still fiercer bear,
On his first night of the hunt,
He could feel the passing decades tax him
Not in body, nor in mind but in spirit.

For every boy slain a man,
Every girl mourning a fallen betrothed,
Every lifetime within a lifetime,
His breast would ache with sadness
Unbecoming of a king, and warrior, and feaster, and drinker, and wrecker of mead benches.
And so wise Beowulf, a long frown often marring his youthful face,
Would contemplate his own evasive entropy,
And in his darkest moments,
Alone amidst his many golden trinkets,
The only things undying as he,
He would pine for the dignified descent into quiet, justified oblivion,
The inevitable downward spiral that claims all men, be he hearty or hale,
King or coward, that he
Was blessed, or rather cursed
Never to suffer.

And he thought back to his earlier days,
Glorious days, days of heroic endeavors
That would swell any man's bosom with pride,
Days that would be woven into legend,
And preserved by the ballads of bards and minstrels;
And as the language of elder times evolved,
So too would the legends of Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, evolve,
Translated by scholars and historians,
Upon whom great prizes, medals, and prestige would be heaped
For even having the barest hand in continuing and propagating the adventures
Of the mythic sunderer of mead-benches.

And as he thought, his bosom was filled
Not with pride, but with longing
To relive those glory days,
Now generations long past.

And sudden as a falling star,
Or a flash of lightning,
Or the incensure of temper in the testy Swedes,
An idea burst into his head:
“In my days of youth, I was merry,
Gay, valiant, and contented.
My strength has been preserved,
But since I assumed the diplomatic responsibilities of the throne,
I have been denied the chance to once more test it.
It is clear my only option:
I must find an answer to the perplexing question
Of this cursed state of undeath.
There must be some sage, or oracle,
Or priest, or sorcerer,
Some wizened wizard, who with
Perilous magicks,
Or heavenly epiphany,
Can divine a solution.
I need find the panacea
For this foul affliction
Of eternal health.”
And so the ring giver sat,
Engaged in guessing
To what vessel of arcane intellect he should turn.
For hours he lost himself in consternation, until
He said, “Ahah! The sagacious Wealhtheow,
Wisest of all women who should grace
All of Midgard, this magnificent artifice
Of the Lord God, eternal bloodless battleground
Of good and evil, heaven and hell, Asgard and Niflheim;
She has drunk deeply from the waters of wisdom;
If she does not know the cause of this devilry,
Then she knows who knows.
I will sail to Heorot, in the land of the Danes,
That grand mead-hall I've twice delivered from gory damnation
At the hands of the twin abominations,
Mother and son,
Who until my arrival cursed and terrified the helpless Danes.
Noble Hrothgar once promised to me
That he would take me as a brother in his heart;
How strange now that in return for saving his life,
I should ask for his assistance in my death.
I hope that my request he should play the part of Cain
Shall not deter him.”

With this, Beowulf ordered it so that he should set sail
To old, familiar, friendly Heorot
In the land of the amicable Danes.
And Despite worried protests
On the part of his honorable shield-bearers,
He insisted that he be delivered alone,
Sailors his only companions,
And them to stay on the boat for the duration of his stay.
He did not wish to burden his brother
With the bellies of anxious, drunken warriors.
And the winds favored him; and scarcely sooner did he declare his departure
Than he declared his arrival.

But Hrothgar, sweetest, kindest brother, did not take him in
With open arms;
Much to the son of Ecgtheow's sadness, his pyre had been burned
Ages hence. But he told his sons
And his sons' sons
Of the mighty and noble hero
Who had bested the ferocious Grendel,
And fiercer demon-spawn begetter
And so Hrothsson, son of Hrothsson,
Son of Hrothsson, Son of Hrothgar,
Was euphoric with elation,
Now the angel made flesh should present himself,
Great-great-grand uncle
And consorter with God in Heaven.
And there still at court
In the now weary, groaning,
But still magnificent and imposing mead hall
Was the great-great-granddaughter
Of the beautiful, nymphly, elegant Wealhtheow,
Werstra. The resemblance to her ancestor was uncanny;
She was the graven image of the queen
That had greeted young Beowulf with a cautious,
Guarded smile, in those regrettably mist-shrouded days.
And poor Beowulf was stricken with gut-wrenching woe;
In his eagerness to parlay with his now long-deceased
Brother, he was momentarily oblivious to his insidious curse;
The past century was foreign to him, and
He felt his conquest over evil as just yesterday.

And Werstra looked upon his long, weary face,
A strange thing, too young to bear the heavy load of memories placed upon it,
Like that of a child made orphan before his very eyes;
And in that moment, though she had scarcely yet exchanged words,
She knew, in her feminine sort of compassionate wisdom,
The mountain of suffering he carried on his shoulders,
The cause of his brooding frown.
And she, moved with pity for this once great man,
Now too great to earn anything but heartfelt pity,
Presented herself to him.
And Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, looked upon her,
And saw in her eyes the very woman
He had known to be insight incarnate
In ancient yesteryear.
And his heart began to change its color,
To sing a different tune, one of hope.
Gazing so for a while, he then spoke:
“Daughter of Wealhtheow, you are just as beautiful, as graceful
As your mother before you. Nay,” -he barked a harsh laugh
At his naïvely misspoken choice of words- “your
Ancestor before you. What name has been handed from
The Heavens to this daughter of Eve
In her cradle?”

And Werstra, taken aback by these endearing words,
Took a moment to respond:
“I am called Werstra, daughter of Wastrel,
daughter of Wontrea, daughter of Wealhtheow, of whom you speak.
Great Wealhtheow, my ancestor, or mother as you say” -she grinned at this-
“Was fabled to be as beautiful as Helen of Troy,
Spoken of in the lands far south.
It has even been whispered that she resembled
The Virgin Mother herself.
Do you truthfully honor me with her image,
Or do you do me too much justice?”
“Nay,” said Beowulf, “You share in full not only her beauty,
But that same look of knowledge, of Odin's one-eyed clairsentience.
Tell me truly: I have lived on this plane for more winters than many empires.
Not a gray hair has grown in my mane, nor a wrinkle
Creased my face since my prime.
Many would think this a boon; I hope that you, in your wisdom,
Can understand the tragedy of my plight and grant me deliverance.”

A frown of thought crossed Werstra's face as she mulled over
The predicament of the erstwhile hero.
Then she gazed at him, and hesitant, said:
“I do not know what ails you. No soul on Heaven or Earth
Knows but God Almighty. But perhaps...”
“Speak!” he urged, “Tell me all you can.”
“Far to the east, where the winds of Niflheim never cease to blow,
There lives a woman, or so she appears: a demon, in truth, Grandmother of Satan,
Murderer before Cain, Sinner before Eve. She is the most vile thing
In all Yggdrasil: the Nidhogg trembles before her,
And she scoffs and denies the Prince of Peace, Son of God.
It was she who thrust the spear in Christ's belly, though with Longinus' hands;
She whispered to the viper who whispered to Eve to partake in what is forbidden;
She told Lucifer not to heed God's decree, to rebel against his master;
Her insolence caused Lilith to refuse to lie beneath Adam;
She lurked in the shadows of Mad Nero's tortured psyche;
She warped once-benign Loki to wreak his suffering upon beautiful Baldr;
And she spawned she who spawned your adversary Grendel.
All evil, all malefaction, all suffering and pain, flows from her wicked cauldron,
As she brews the stew of darkness from the blood of innocents.
And as from her pain blossoms, so by her decree it shall end.
Though rare, there are those who have confronted her,
In her nightmarish hut of doom,
Presented to her a blue rose,
And made their wishes known.
And though she is a foul, wretched shrew of a thing,
She craves more than suffering the coveted blue rose.
For acquiring such a thing is always a tremendous task,
And she admires the brave, the strong, the young, the determined and comely;
All things that she is not.
Bring her this thing, and she alone may end this hex upon your soul,
Over which even God no longer has dominion.”

Beowulf sat in silence. “Where may I find a blue rose?
I've never heard of such a thing.”
“At the peak of the unfinished Tower of Babel,
Symbol of impudent pride, Bellerophonic hubris
Another artifice of the monstrous witch, there is a garden.
In this garden grows many wondrous things, but most precious of all
Is the blue rosebush. It's thorns hold in them
The agony of all those who have suffered unduly,
A wicked venom that could claim any lesser man
And deter any with even a hint of cowardice.
But you alone, I suspect, can brave the task.”
“And where is the tower?”
“It is in no ordinary place. It is a thing in dreams, a phantasm
That reveals itself only to the valiant in heart.
Simply lay yourself to sleep with the humility
That the Lord demanded and was denied from
The ill-fated constructors of that abominable tower of spite,
Pure thoughts of supplication and awe
Before His Magnificence
Filling your soul to exclusion.
Then will you find that gross ambition,
The legacy of Prometheus' fire,
Within yourself, as it is in all men.”

“I have bested many foul foes without,
But never have dared to venture within myself,
To fight my own sins in the realm of dreams.
But tonight, as the sun sets, and the meadhall grows quiet,
I will see if I prove a worthy adversary
To myself.”
“Be careful, brave Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, champion of men.
Once the rose is yours, drawn from the ephemeral mists beyond
Into this coil, it shall pass from the inchoate fantasy planes,
So unreal, even the hag queen has no dominion,
To the realm of the living;
From dreams to the dreaming.
She will sense you; you need not seek to find her.
Her frightful cabin of wicked diablerie
Is intrinsic to all darker things of the world.
It will be made manifest wherever you should tarry;
And if you are too long in appearing,
She will unleash all her most terrible curses, poxes, hexes and banes
And rip the rose from your dead grasp. I pray this is not your fate,
Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, grand ring giver and savior of Heorot.
Go with my blessing; pray that the Lord favors you in this crusade,
Though even he cannot walk beside you
In the dark and darker places you shall soon tread.

“Does this foul aberration have a name?
Would Adam, at the dawn of creation, even dare
To put words describing such an abortion of nature,
All things good and light?”
“It is called Baba Yaga, the Dark Grandmother,
At whom God in Heaven trembles in fear as a son at an enraged mother.
The shadow she casts before the sun is nightly oblivion,
And the day is bright only at her mercy.
Tread carefully, scourge of the mead hall;
You walk in the presence of elder evils.”

Beowulf knelt before the maiden, took her hand and blest it:
“Fairest, sagest Werstra, you do me a great service in this.
For years I have been trapped in my own youth,
Condemned to dally in the mundane coil.
Now, perhaps, by plunging into the darkness once more,
I may finally look upon God's radiant visage;
Eternal rest and contentment shall greet me in Paradise;
A just reward for all I have given to His children,
So He shall provide for me.
I must depart, my lady; I go to do battle with the hubris of man,
A more terrible beast there has never been.”

And Beowulf, hero of Danes, king of Geats,
Champion of men and challenger of gods,
Lay down to bed that evening in Heorot hall
With not a glimmer of pride, no thought of victory or glory,
Nothing but humble praise for Almighty God,
And thus embarked into the dream-scape,
On his final adventure.

He awoke gradually, at first only dimly aware of his alien surroundings.
The gallons of mead the night before took their time in wearing off, 
And though the blurriness quickly subsided, it was only to be replaced
By a blinding headache;
But the dream-time is a curious thing,
And as scarce hours of sleep can seem to account for a second lifetime,
So can earthly ails pass in mere seconds
At the whim of those queer, sinister shadows that claim the imagination their domain,
Called fey on the tongue of Adam,
Leprechauns, spriggans, grigs, and stranger still.
So momentarily, Beowulf was recovered from his voluminous swilling
Of the nectar of gods,
And cast his gaze about his environs.

Vast plains of sand and grass spread in all directions;
Off on the horizons, the dim outlines of mountains rose and fell,
Shaping, twisting writhing before the eye.
Clouds formed overhead, outpoured their fill,
And disappeared as mysteriously as they came.
Lightning crackled under a sunny sky,
Rainbows shined in darkened skies;
And plunging from the madness,
A single column of perfect order amidst the discord,
Rose the magnificent, awe-inspiring
Titan of titans, the many-fabled
Tower of Babel, relic of bygone days
Of fantastic kingdoms and mad kings,
Who in supreme arrogance deigned to look upon God
Not on knees from below,
But perched on a throne above.
Up and up and upper it climbed,
Piercing the dome of the world,
Its peak lost in clinging mists miles above the earth.

And Beowulf gazed in awe at this massive monolith,
Testament to human triumph
And warning of mortal failure,
And he shuddered slightly; he began to wonder
If even Beowulf, with the strength of thirty men
And stamina to do herds of oxen to shame
Could be  bested by a task so daunting.
But he remembered the Lord, his constant companion,
And could feel even here His comforting presence,
And knew that no task was insurmountable to the pious.
Invigorated by this zeal, he strode toward the spire,
And, finding ample hand-holds in the age-worn masonry,
Began to scale the tower.

At first, the going was easy; the slayer of beasts ate many miles of stone
Before the first sweat was broken.
But the red sun beat heavy upon him,
And the hours weighed against him,
Sinews bulged throughout his frame as each grasp became effort,
Then challenge,
Then agony.
So long was he at it,
His back began to fold before the deadly heat;
He blistered as red as the blazing eye that glared at his passing,
As if disapproving of the worm that dared to touch the heavens.
There came a time when the ground disappeared beneath him,
Too far to bear imagination,
And still the tower soared endlessly above
Into the blue canopy that blanketed the hellish realm
Of inchoate suggestion intrinsic to the mind's eye of men.
And weary, frightened, almost devoid of hope,
He called upon his Father to lend him the strength he needed.
He pleaded for mercy, cried out to the abode of angels stretched above,
“Aye! Alas, rescind your punishment of whatever my wrong that invokes your ire.
I am nearly beaten, spent, a burned and broken shell,
Clinging to a harsh road leading nowhere,
Devoid of the impetuousness that brought me here.
I beg you, hear me, any who answer my call,
Give me the strength that I may do this one last thing,
To earn my seat beside you.”
And the winds blew and whipped up high,
Stinging his back with icy fingers,
As he had endured for hours before,
Whistling lonely to fill the silence as the once-mighty hero's lungs gave way.
And as his hold was slipping, and still no answer came,
He was struck with a horrible truth;
No God or god would help him now.
No immortal force was there to lift him on his way.
By no one's grace, no divine permission,
Could he be aided.
He was alone, and the horror of this truth nearly sufficed to end him there.
But as he swayed and grew limp before the harsh, uncaring, fiery orb,
His consciousness dimming and his eyes closing,
A hope suddenly dawned on him;
He was alone, mortal, human.
He could accomplish nothing but by his own merit and will.
All those things men had done,
All miracles,
All victories,
All triumphs,
Owed nothing to anyone but the men behind them.
And he knew that he could rely on no God or Aesir,
Angel or valkyrie, fate, fortune, or cosmic balance to see him through:
And he did not need them anyway.
All the strength, fortitude, and will to move mountains,
Raise cities, and craft worlds,
Lay within his breast.
And as he began to climb once more, the tower no longer seemed to stretch infinitely.
He could see a tiny point far above him,
Growing larger and larger as he scampered upward like a man possessed,
Until at last he triumphantly stuck his bruised and calloused hand
Over the edge of the precipice.
It was his greatest moment.

And when he heaved himself up, what he saw was more beautiful than anything imaginable:
A magnificent garden, laden with thousands of sorts of exotic vegetation;
The leaves were the lushest green, doing the finest emeralds to shame;
Millions of flowers burst with a million hues,
Dazzling the eye with unearthly brilliance.
All manner of little birds and beasts frolicked in this microcosmic utopia.
And Beowulf son of Ecgtheow, mused:
“So this is the garden of Eden, where Adam, Man, was first born,
Not in body, but in spirit.”
And he sucked in the succulent fragrances,
Let the smells and sounds and sights and tastes bathe him in radiance.
His gut suddenly ravenous from days of climbing,
He plucked a grape from a twisting vine and bit in:
Nectarine, exquisite juices tickled his tongue and tumbled down his throat.
He gorged himself on the cornucopia of bliss
That made itself readily available;
Until he wandered into the center of the garden,
And came upon the fabled blue rose.

Of a deep, azure distinction,
Capturing and twisting the light like a sapphire,
A single blossom lay deep at the heart
Of the wicked, fanged foliage.
And wicked it was;
In contrast to the glowing rainbow surrounding,
And the cobalt gem within,
The rosebush was rife with vicious thorns,
Hooked and barbed, some a good hand long
Like assassins' daggers, gleaming murderously in evening lamplight;
Others so tiny they nearly evaded detection,
Shredding the hand to pieces invisibly,
A million razor-thin scars appearing
As if from nowhere;
And all was coated with a thin glistening film,
A deadly venom that burned the air
And cast an acrid stench;
And most horrifying of all
Was a faint, sinister whisper,
Emanating from the demon-plant,
Shrieking and moaning, crooning and sighing,
The murmurs of the wretched souls
Consigned to eternal torture and oblivion,
All those who had failed in life,
Whether by hesitation, cowardice,
Weakness, or mere ill fortune.

But epic Beowulf,
Favored son of the Shieldings,
And eternal bane of the meadbench crafter,
Did not waver or falter a smidgeon;
He plunged his grasp deep into the hell-thorns.
Extraordinary agony electrified his frame,
Fire shot through his veins,
Millions of pinpricks, scars, and stabs pervaded his body.
A scream started to escape his throat,
But was cut short as every muscle in his body seized;
He gurgled, asphyxiated by pain,
And finally let out a tortured gasp.
And as he wrenched his mangled appendage from out of the holocaust,
The suffering intensified a thousandfold,
And he collapsed to the grass,
Precious prize in hand.

There he lay for untold hours,
Cringing in the discomfiture
Of every crushing defeat
And every fall from grace
Manifest such that no mortal corpus could withstand.
His blood drenched the soil,
It poured forth,
A pool forming around him,
Growing larger and larger;
It filled the garden,
Flowing over the edges,
More blood than could possibly have been contained in his veins;
And his last memory was curtains of sanguine vitae
Drenching the sides of the Tower of myth-shrouded Babel.

He awoke in his bed in Heorot hall.
Dawn was fast approaching;
The sun broke the horizon and bathed the countryside
A comforting golden yellow.
He looked at his hand,
And found a mutilated pulp
Enclosing the topaz blossom
So coveted by the foul witch Baba Yaga.

At once awestruck at the crystalline majesty of the bard-sung flower
And mortified at the gory tragedy that was once a fine hand,
He tried to pluck the rose from the fleshy mass,
But found it was firmly affixed in his otherwise useless grasp.
Steadfast it held, as if growing from him.
Then the ground shook,
And a whirring and whirling was heard from the wood nearby.
A strangeness, to be sure,
Beowulf took up his blade,
Quickly donned a mail shirt and bear cloak,
And set to see what was the matter.

And traipsing through that ancient woodspan,
His feet crunched on gold and amber leaves underfoot.
The birds chirped sleepily,
Already dulled for the long sleep ahead.
The picturesque peaceable tone
Was disrupted by that spinning,
Now accompanied by an occasional huge crash.

Not far did he wander so
Til he stumbled upon a strange clearing.
Many gargantuan trees lay about,
A terrible blow must have struck them to fell them so.
And there was the cyclone hell,
Twirling faster than any tornado dervish;
As he approached, the whistling of wind grew softer
And the shape spun slower, slowly coalescing
Into a strange hut propped on the dancing claws of fiendish fowl;
A fence appeared surrounding the cursed abode,
Iron stakes topped with skulls,
Mouthes curled in eternal rictus grins,
One stake bare, devoid of a smiling victim:
At the hut of Baba Yaga,
There is always room for one more.

Cautiously, he opened and stepped through the gate;
It squeaked loudly, unoiled for untold millenia,
Creaking ominously, groaning and shifting,
Opened not half-a-dozen times since before the dawn of time.
Standing before the house, windowless and doorless,
A tongue outfurled, a mouth gaped open,
Lined with hooked and barbed fangs,
Bidding darkly he should enter,
Be devoured by that avian nightmare,
And lost in the hungry abyss.
But Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, son of Hrethel, brother of Odin,
Harbored no fear in his heart for the foul cockesque monstrosity of an abode.
He stepped up the slimy tongue,
And, beginning to cross his chest, stopping himself abruptly,
Crossed the threshold to Baba Yaga's hell.

A strange hell, to be sure!
It was no vast, infernal realm,
No fantastic or terrible flames whipped or gouted about;
But rather, a little cabin, with a bed, and a cauldron, and a little curtained private-room,
And a strange old crone, head and shoulders taller than a strapping Swede,
With a huge nose, long as a sword,
Like a beak of a predatory raptor,
Eyes gleaming bright green,
Covered in vast rifts of wrinkles and bulging warts.
She was hideous to look upon.

And the witch grinned as he entered,
And beamed at the sight of the precious rose,
Casting and warping the scarce light of the cabin,
Throwing a weird, flickering azure glow on the faces of hero and hag alike.
“So you are the valiant young lad who has come to bring me a present.
Well, young at a look, and still green beside the mountains.
Beowulf, you are called? And many things more.
Great ring giver, son of Ecgtheow, grandson of patriarch Hrethel,
Hero of Danes, king of Geats,
Fallen god and ascended mortal,
Slayer of fierce and fiercer beasts, defender of men,
Bard-sung and elder-spoken, fabled round the winter flame,
And- oh! Your mead preoccupation, of course!
You've shattered many a meadbench in your day, noble drunkard.
Tell me: how many have you crafted?
Have ever you made for another, instead of destroyed?
No matter. Your mind is far too addled by your saccharine toxins
To even begin to heed me.
Oh, king of the ignorant fools' droolpit,
Champion of vainglory and hero of tyrants,
Inspiration of bloodthirsty savages, dumb brute of bullish strength,
Hero of a dying people, anachronism of a declining age,
Here I welcome you to my humble abode.
Oh, and do continue dripping on the rug so;
I just love scrubbing bloodstains out of my exquisite ursine skins.
So what riches or women, kingdoms or power do you beg for,
Or do you simply give priceless flowers to gross hags out of habit?
Say your piece, barbarian, or leave me to my cooking.”

“Do not tempt me, vile shrew.
I have climbed to the pinnacle of perfection,
Suffered unimaginable agonies,
To acquire your shining trinket.
And I have no need of gold,
Nor false companionship;
I am already king,
And my might is unquenchable.
This, in sooth, is the crux of my dilemma.
I have approached you not to grant me strength;
I carry Atlas on my back,
I fuel the fire in the sky,
Where stone and dust fail the test of time I remain standing.
I came because I was told
That in you and you alone
Might I end my lordly dominion.
I yearn not to breathe free, but to be free of breath.
Though now, glancing disdainfully upon you,
I cannot help but wonder
What you, poor old relic, decaying thing
That would disgrace any doorstep but this shameful hovel,
Could do to harm me.”

The witch began to cackle,
A harsh, barking thing, dry of humor and sick of wit,
And retorted, “Were you expecting some grand demon,
An epic fiend studded in brass warplates
And swathed in bloodslick robes?
A loud, booming voice, great claws that clickety-clack,
A hundred arms with a thousand dancing swords,
Fire blasting from every orifice?
Is that your idea of evil?
Of true wickedness?
Am I called grandmother of Satan for my grandeur?
But of course, you miss the whole point, ignorant boy!
You have known hardship, uncertainty,
Danger, and disaster.
But what, when you clung with your death-grip to the  now blood-spackled spire,
Ran through your head?
What was that strange thing that gripped you,
Paralyzed you, nearly brought you to your knees?
These past months I have watched you, son of Ecgtheow.
When did the insidious seed first enter your mind,
That you should prefer noble decline,
To constant adversity and duty and servitude to the masses?
What do you call this wrenching of gut, when that simple mind of  yours
Whirs to life, and starts to truly think?
All your life, you have come easily upon everything.
Whatever the task at hand, whatever the future held,
Your might would see you through.
But now, finally, you have been matched- bested!
This is fear, Beowulf! Fear!
You looked in horror, sheer, intense horror,
Upon an eternity of stagnation.
And again, above the clouds, you were terrified by failure.
No! Worse! For you cannot fail,
Unstoppable savior of Heorot!
You feared an eternity of trying.
And now, you seek to fail.
The hero's mantle hangs heavy on your shoulders,
A great responsibility, but one that, no matter what,
You will always fulfill. You cannot conceive the alternative.
So you wish to be relieved of this burden,
To show the world that you can no longer save them.
You want to give up.
But no! Brave warrior, valiant, noble paragon of triumph,
You cannot give up! You don't know how.
So you embark on an epic adventure
To 'end your plight',
Because you don't know how to admit to yourself that you are finished.
You want some grand evil,
Something no man can withstand,
To nobly dispatch you; you want
Not to fail, but to succeed in failing,
To do the very best you could,
Heart unswerving to the last.
But you cry and moan that nothing can face you.

You wish for me to destroy you?
Is that what this rose is for?
I cannot give you that;
None can.
I am but an old woman, peaceably residing in this humble hut.
Those unfortunate men that surround me
Did not die by my hand;
My gift is in revealing to them unspeakable truth,
That they may destroy themselves.
So my payment to you is this:

You are weak, Beowulf.
You are the weakest man or beast alive.
Every man lives and dies;
He wins and loses, fails and succeeds,
He has his share of triumphs and defeats,
Glory and tragedy in equal parts rule him.
You call this weakness; you do not realize,
He, though he may not know it, has choice.
As you yourself saw at Babel,
No outside force governs your actions.
The power to accomplish any task
Lies in every man; it is simply a matter of determination.
Men live and die not because they are made to,
But because, at a basic level,
They choose to.
You cannot choose.
You continue to live, to succeed,
Because you do not have the strength within you to fail.
You are slavishly consigned to continue onward,
A puppet of those around you and the whims of chance,
Because you do not control your own fate.
You are weak, Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow,
Descendant of Hrethel,
Champion of man;
And you shame humanity with your wretchedness.”

With these final words, a deciding blow was struck.
Beowulf sank into a stupor; he could not comprehend the judgment pronounced.
Thinking furiously, his gaze flickered about,
Casting desperately for something to comfort him,
And make sense of this apparent madness.
His lips moved to speak, but the words did not come.
As his eyes began to water,
He burst through the door and rushed outside,
Stumbling and galloping into the forest.
Shrieking laughter echoed from the hut,
Heard for miles around,
And the witch screamed after him:
“Off you run, mutt! Die alone that you may disgust the world no further!
Burn in the hell of your own devising, craven worm!”

Hours later, the beast had covered miles,
And finally collapsed to the dirt,
Tears welling from his eyes,
His face red and contorted with unbearable sadness.
There he wept, curled on the ground,
Moaning and wimpering,
Til he finally ran dry and crawled beneath a great oak.
He sat against the bark, then burst into tears once more
As he drew his sword from its scabbard
And raised it high above his head.
And as he looked back on his vapid, vainglorious life,
He whispered, “When I was ignorant, blind, and powerless,
I felt powerful and worthy.
Now I know, and see, and have the strength to rule my own fate,
And yet I feel so weak.
Now, I realize:
True strength is not in denying fear,
But in acting despite it.”
And he plunged his blade into his now-empty heart,
Doing himself what no other force in heaven or earth could.
And so Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, met his end.