<blockquote>Eolh-secg eard hæfþ oftust on fenne<br>
wexeð on wature, wundaþ grimme,<br>
blode breneð beorna gehwylcne<br>
ðe him ænigne onfeng gedeþ.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The Eolh-sedge is mostly to be found in a marsh;<br>it grows in the water and makes a ghastly wound,<br>covering with blood every warrior who touches it.</blockquote>
<p>There is not a Norwegian rune poem for Algiz.</p>
<p>A modern poem:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I'm clinging to your waist<br/>
like you're a floating log<br/>
and I'm halfway to drowning<br/>
not knowing how to breathe with a non-human face.</p>
<p>Someone once called me the Rainbow Bridge,<br/>
being the crossing point between so many worlds,<br/>
but I am neither bi<br/>
nor could I ever abide<br/>
frost over the surface of this roiling sea<br/>
in this metaphor of mine.<br/>
I move too violent,<br/>
too constant,<br/>
for the whole thing to freeze<br/>
over, you see.</p>
<p>But I certainly feel like being quartered<br/>
face from hand from back from limb<br/>
trembling to keep my mind<br/>
in a bedroom lost and somehow dimmed.<br/>
Three different bloods rage inside<br/>
and two are battling for my skin<br/>
and your fingertips brushing the back of my neck,<br/>
the temples where bone and antler connect,<br/>
are the only reminder you're here to protect<br/>
me, promised by palm to keep me sane<br/>
even if draconity ever overcame<br/>
me and my body forcibly changed<br/>
to that of a beast.</p>
<p>Do you think, if a stranger ever saw,<br/>
they'd mistake me for a particularly messed-up elk?<br/>
Wonder where my eyes went, or why so blunted my maw?<br/>
A creature too exquisite for this world, too peculiar for their ilk,<br/>
have to always stay on the periphery<br/>
or in long-lost bedrooms where nobody can see<br/>