FRITZ--And if I had my way we would not go.
RUDOLPH--Nor would we go had I mine, Fritz. But we
Have not our way. The dragon has his way.
As far as Niflheim the North is red.
FRITZ--Are we their sheep that we must follow them
Or be hung up on trees?
RUDOLPH-- He follows us.
FRITZ--Who do these woods belong to, anyhow?
RUDOLPH--Where a man puts his foot the dragon puts
His belly, and the man's track disappears.
Where is the tree that has not felt the storm?
Have they not disappeared? Like leaves the tribes
Are scattered.
FRITZ-- It has blown down trunk and all.
RUDOLPH--Forests and rivers and ten thousand graves
Lie under that red paw.
FRITZ-- It stains the world.
RUDOLPH--The Weser rolls down bodies to the sea;
Their yellow hair is matted in the Rhine;
The deer that drinks the Aller in the night
Starts back from bloody faces in the stream.
They are our fathers, Fritz, who cannot sleep
While this coiled Hunger tracks us toward the north.
FRITZ--And we must feed it, eh? We must grub roots,
Fatten ourselves on acorns in the wood,
As swine do, and then waddle to the swamp
And stuff its belly so that it will sleep
And trouble us no more, we must do that?
RUDOLPH--No; we must leave, and starve it.
FRITZ-- It don't starve.
More hunger means more flesh. Let's feed it steel.
RUDOLPH--Steel draws the blood and brings the hunger on.
FRITZ--Then draw the life. We don't feed it enough.