was rereading the Prose Edda (as one does) and found myself caught—again—on the figure of Fáfnir. the cursed son. the dragon not by birth but by transformation.
it’s strange, isn’t it? how dragons in norse myth are never just dragons. they’re warnings. griefs. consequences.
and yet when he—hiccup—reaches out with an open palm and says, “i'm not gonna hurt you,” the entire mythos ruptures. the boy befriends the wound.
sometimes i think he’s not just playing a character. sometimes i think he knows.
the actor in orlando, i mean. the one with the too-accurate gait. the storm in his eyes.
he speaks like someone who’s read the same margins i have.
like someone who’s seen the same runes carved in the dust.
i wonder if he knows that the old icelandic word for “soul” (sál) shares roots with the word for “sea.”
and how, in the sagas, longing is always something that drowns you.
i am, of course, drowning.
– til ragnarök or florida, arden