Pétur Knútsson, 13 February 2018.

Þorsteinn frá Hamri.

The funeral of the poet Þorsteinn frá Hamri will be today, 13 February 2018. For my English-speaking friends here is an example of his poetry, with a quick gloss and commentary. This is the poem “Rift” from the book “Skessukatlar”, 2013.

	Rof	Rift

	Vetrarkvöldin,	The winter evenings,
	voru það kvöld, eða sögur?	was that evenings, or stories?

	Ský og byljir, voru það	Clouds and blizzards, was that
	ský og byljir	clouds and blizzards
	eða myrk örlög manna?	or the dark fates of men?

	Og sunnanblærinn, var það	And the breeze from the south, was that
	sunnanblærinn	the breeze from the south
	eða Sörli að þeysa í garð?	or Sörli clattering into the yard?*

	Slíks spurði enginn ...	Questions like these were not asked ...

	Svo splundraðist eitthvað	Then something was rift apart
	í mönnum og veðrum,	between men and weathers
	mönnum og orðum ...	men and words ...

	Mörgum orðum.	Many words.

The pivotal line in the poem is "Questions like these were not asked"
Before this, there are three examples of whole thoughts and the possibility of splitting them each into two two different thoughts.
Now, after this change, he says that a rift has occurred between men and reality, between men and words,
so that we have now sundered these integrities. This has happened to many words.

This is one of the cental theses of one of my favourite writers, Owen Barfield. Barfield does not condemn this rift, but acknowledges its importance to human understanding. But he suggests that we have to work through it to achieve a new integrity.

* Þorsteinn adds a note quoting from the Old Icelandic Sörla þáttur: "And one morning, when Þorgerður went out to look to her laundry, there was fine weather, sunshine and a southerly breeze. She looks up and sees a huge man riding into the yard. She recognised him, and said, "Here is a great deal of sunshine and southerly wind, and Sörli is riding into the yard."