I stood on the strand to the sea-cliffs near,
Hard by the billows. To the home of my birth
Fast was I fixed. Few indeed are there
Of men who have ever at any time
5 Beheld my home in the hard waste-land.
In the brown embrace of the billows and waves
I was locked each dawn. Little I dreamed
That early or late I ever should
With men at the mead-feast mouthless speak forth
10 Words of wisdom. It is a wondrous thing,
And strange to the sight when one sees it first
That the edge of a knife and the active hand
And wit of the earl who wields the blade
Should bring it about that I bear unto thee
15 A secret message, meant for thee only,
Boldly announce it, so that no other man
May speak our secrets or spread them abroad.
1. This riddle occurs in the manuscript just before _The Husband's
Message_, and some editors think that in the riddle we have a proper
beginning for the poem. First is the account of the growth of the
reed, or block of wood, then the account of its voyages, and last the
message conveyed. There is really no way of telling whether the poems
were meant to go together.