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A button poetry inspired by the Norse mythology comic by @yeehawpim
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When the Gods came to the Great wolf
Fenrir
He must have thought it just another day
Bright and grand
He must have thought it a game
These were the people who had raised him
And there was Tyr
his friend
They bind him He broke free
He must have rejoiced in his victory
Then the gods came again With different chains
Doubt would have taken hold But he must have ignored it
Bolstering his resolve in his strength thinking
He had nothing to fear
Since Tyr was there
But when the gods
Brought forth the cords
He must have sensed something amiss
This was no game
They wanted something from him
He must have recalled The fleeting hateful stares
But he also must have also remembered
How he played with Tyr
He would not let anything Happen to him
He must have cursed himself
For doubting his friend
For asking for Tyr's hand
But what is done is done he couldn’t go back
And now I sit and wonder
When the wolf couldn't break the cords
Did he pause?
Did Tyr know what would happen?
And offered his flesh regardless?
Or Maybe In guild for what was going to happen to his friend?
What he had caused?
There must have been A moment
When the great wolf pled
Hoping that he would be saved by his friend
Or maybe he wished for Tyr to pull back his hand?
And now I think
That when the wolf bit down
Maybe it wasn't from anger
Maybe it was from sorrow
His friend had made his choice
So maybe he bit
So the blood would hide his tears
Tyr was there
And he had betrayed him
A Hellhound is a Mythical Monster of a Canine form. There are two sub-groups, Feral and Domestic. In terms of all around power, they are the weakest classification of High Tier Mythic.
Feral
This sub-group of hellhound is characterized in general by the types of canine monsters that resemble wild Canine species. They are strong, brave, and Fierce. Most Ferals live in Savannahs or Forests. They are often stubborn and independent, even while working in a pack.
Cerberus
A type of Hellhound characterized by three heads. All three heads have different personalities, but the monster itself only has one SOUL. They often have dark brown or black fur, and red eyes. They can be both male and female. They hunt by using the three head working together to track their prey. They are solitary hunters, but live in pack-like groups inside a territory.
Cryote
A Cryote is a type of hellhound slightly resembling a Coyote. Their fur is commonly black, grey, brown, cream, tan, and white, and they have blue eyes. Their species is strictly male, not one female has ever occurred. Instead they breed with a Vexen or another hellhound. They are most commonly known for their Howl, which sounds like a human cry of mourning or despair. It causes it's victims to be overcome with hopelessness and despair.
Vexen
A Vexen is a type of Hellhound slightly resembling a Fox. They have reddish grey fur, with white paws, and a White tail tip. Their species is strictly female, not one male has ever occurred. Instead, they breed with a Cryote or another hellhound. They are most commonly known for their enchanting bark. It lures male animals by barking at them from the shadows and retreating. The male Follows, only to be led to an awaiting pack.
Dinro
A Dinro is a type of hellhound slightly resembling a Dingo. They are quite often a Light ginger, Tan, Tan and Black, or Cream, and black eyes. They can be both male and female. Their hunting method is a Pack hunt. Working in groups of up to ten, they can even take down an Elephant. One Dinro scares the prey to the rest of the pack, and the rest pounce, attacking every possible soft spot. They can just as likely be male or female.
Jacan
A Jacan is a Hellhound species that slightly resembles a Jackal. They have Cream and Tawny beige fur, and Ice blue Eyes. They hunt using a pack technique similar to a Dinro, but the packs can have up to thirty five members. They can be both male and female, but are more commonly female.
Fenrir
A Fenrir is a type of hellhound closely resembling a giant wolf. They have black fur, blood red eyes, and are always on fire. They are solitary hellhounds, and they hunt using their incredible speed, strength, and stamina to take down their prey. They can be both male and female, but are more commonly male.
I hate how many people look at Loki (especially with a post-Marvel lens) and act like the Christian writers turned him from a generally heroic gender-fluid god into a Satan-esque villain. It’s like these people only read the parts of the myths that support this claim and then ignore every other myth that Loki is in.
First off with the gender-fluid stuff, he only turns into a female three or four times (one of them is theorized to be Loki but never outright confirmed). All of these times are a different race (Horse, Aesir, Jotun), and all situational. The horse is to lure away Svadilfari and stop the builder from finishing Asgard’s wall , the Aesir (never stated what race his is here) is to accompany Thor as his bridesmaid to make sure the plan works (and probably watch Thor be embarrassed by the dress he’s wearing) (Þrymskviða), another as the Aesir to learn about Baldur’s weakness to mistletoe, and the final one is to stop Baldur from coming back to life after Loki got him killed. I’m pretty sure Loki turns into a bird more often. Finally in the Lokasenna, he and Odin insult each other for doing unwomanly things, Odin doing magic and Loki giving birth to children (yes plural), and then Frigg (or Freyja) pretty much tells them to leave their skeletons in the closets.
Secondly, there is a post I’ve seen a couple times (and it is what inspired me to make this post) by @incorrectnorse-quotes where they got a message saying Loki is a faithful husband. The problem with this is that it forgets that Angrboda exists. Loki has had sex with three people that with children coming from them, and he claims a fourth. The three he has children from are; Svadilfari (Sleipnir), Angrboda (Fenrir, Hel(a), and Jormungandr), and his wife Sigyn (Vali and Narfi). He (and Odin at one point) claims to have had sex with Thor’s wife Sif. That claim is said by Loki during the Lokasenna, after Sif says he can’t say anything bad about her.
Finally while I agree that he isn’t the devil figure some make him out to be, he definitely isn’t what I would consider a good person (some people seem to think he is the nicest person in Asgard). For example, he once completely plucked out a woman’s (Sif’s) hair, for no given reason (an event which led to the creation of Mjolnir). Another example is the murder of Baldur (which we are probably missing some context to, but I’m working off the context we have), where he gets Baldur killed for “complaining about nightmares of his death.” My final example comes from the Lokasenna again, where the entire story is “Loki crashes a party, uses an old oath to stop from getting kicked out, insults almost everyone at the party (except Thor), admits to killing Baldur, then leaves.”
Also I’m not sure what version of the builder myth OSP was using, but in the version I'm familiar with the Aesir only agree to a deal with the builder (after shorting his time from three seasons to one) because of Loki’s advice, which is why they have him fix the problem.
All things considered, Loki seems to be Asgard’s resident asshole and occasional problem solver.
For a more in depth look I’d recommend this essay by Reddit user u/rockstarpirate, where he talks also about Norse gender views. (Warning it’s 21 pages)
First off, it feels like most people see that Snorri Sturluson was Christian and immediately assume he did what the Irish monks did to Irish mythology. This completely ignores why he wrote the myths down, which was to establish a cultural connection between Iceland and Norway, in order to try and get Iceland to join the Kingdom of Norway (which failed). It also ignores that fact that he WASN’T A MONK. Outside of a part about the Aesir being Trojans and living in Asia (which makes no sense when looking at the rest of the Edda and the myths within), and some stuff about some great god who is more powerful than all of the Aesir and is never actually named, there isn’t much evidence to there being large post-Christian changes.
The second problem is that the theory focuses too much on Loki. He doesn’t do much during Ragnarök. He captains a ship (whatever that meant to the Norse) and he kills/dies to Heimdallr. Each of his kids from Angrboda does more. Fenrir eats Odin, and in some versions also the sun, moon, and stars. Jormungandr floods Midgard and poisons the sky, along with killing the strongest of the Aesir, Thor. Hel(a) brings an army of Draugr from her realm to fight Odin and Freya’s einherjar (Freya got half of those who died in battle). I agree that Ragnarök is a story of revenge, but its not Loki’s. ITS THE JOTNAR’S REVENGE. Revenge for a long list of insults and grievances that started with the killing of Ymir during the Voluspa by Odin and his brothers. Also, both Fenrir and Jormungandr are getting revenge against the gods they hate most, whom they are stated to kill. In the end Surtr, king of Muspelheim, kills Freyr, destroys Asgard, and burns all of the worlds (which since they are made of Ymir’s corpse, make this technically Ymir’s funeral pyre). Also the Jotnar on Loki’s ship aren’t his troops, they are led by a different Jotun, and it isn’t even his ship.
I could do an entire other post on the problems with how Loki gets viewed through modern lenses, and I’m tempted to.