Kalevala IV

KALEVALA Translated by John Martin Crawford Transcribed by Echo of Snac

RUNE I, PART IV BIRTH OF WAINAMOINEN Then the daughter of the Ether, Now the hapless water-mother, Raised her shoulders out of water, Raised her knees above the ocean, That the duck might build her dwelling,

Build her nesting-place in safety. Thereupon the duck in beauty, Flying slowly, looking round her, Spies the shoulders of the maiden, Sees the knees of Ether's daughter, Now the hapless water-mother,

Thinks them to be grassy hillocks, On the blue back of the ocean. Thence she flies and hovers slowly, Lightly on the knee she settles, Finds a nesting-place befitting, Where to lay her eggs in safety.

Here she builds her humble dwelling, Lays her eggs within, at pleasure, Six, the golden eggs she lays there, Then a seventh, an egg of iron; Sits upon her eggs to hatch them, Quickly warms them on the knee-cap

Of the hapless water-mother; Hatches one day, then a second, Then a third day sits and hatches. Warmer grows the water round her, Warmer is her bed in ocean, While her knee with fire is kindled,

And her shoulders too are burning, Fire in every vein is coursing. Quick the maiden moves her shoulders, Shakes her members in succession, Shakes the nest from its foundation, And the eggs fall into ocean,

Dash in pieces on the bottom Of the deep and boundless waters. In the sand they do not perish, Not the pieces in the ocean; But transformed, in wondrous beauty All the fragments come together

Forming pieces two in number, One the upper, one the lower, Equal to the one, the other. From one half the egg, the lower, Grows the nether vault of Terra: From the upper half remaining,

Grows the upper vault of Heaven; From the white part come the moonbeams, From the yellow part the sunshine, From the motley part the starlight, From the dark part grows the cloudage; And the days speed onward swiftly,

Quickly do the years fly over, From the shining of the new sun From the lighting of the full moon.