Madr's two stanzas both take humankind as their subject and both frame the reading through humility rather than pride: the Norwegian poem calls man an augmentation of the dust, an image of mortal, earthy origin recalling the same acceptance of physical limitation the Old English Mann stanza builds toward through its account of death, though here stated as man's basic nature from the outset rather than as an ending reached only at the stanza's close. The Norwegian stanza then turns abruptly to a second, seemingly unconnected image, the great span of a hawk's talon, a juxtaposition Dickins' 1915 edition does not resolve with confidence, possibly contrasting human smallness against a bird of prey's formidable reach.
The Icelandic poem instead builds a warmer, more social picture: man is delight of man, a plain statement of human companionship's value, augmentation of the earth, echoing the Norwegian poem's own dust image in gentler terms, and adorner of ships, a specifically maritime image fitting Iceland's own settlement history and seafaring economy, humankind read here through what it builds and beautifies rather than only through its humble origin. Dickins' 1915 edition treats both stanzas as belonging to the poems' more reflective register, closer to the Old English Mann and Ear in tone than to the more purely descriptive stanzas Isa or Bjarkan offer, humankind's nature named directly rather than illustrated through a single vivid image alone.