Isis, as a beggar posed,
walks Wa-Set’s Avenue Of Rams.
They bow – beyond perception – low
their horn-winged heads
as by she goes,
her Horus in her hands…
In January of this year, I thought of a line as I was walking about and, as I often do, texted it to myself:
Isis, as a beggar posed
Seven months and five days later, I finished what had now become a 12-part poem of 11,144 words, retelling, with other Ancient Egyptian myth-elements and plenty of creative license, The Contendings Of Set & Horus.
Su-Tekh (Set) hunts Isis, cornering her outside the City Of The Sceptre.
Nephthys, Ou-Bast (Bastet), & Wadj-Et do their best to defend the mother & her child: the infant Horus.
Anpu (Anubis), with the help of Thoth, performs a mummification on the dead Osiris.
Horus, empowered to adulthood by Hathor on behalf of Ra, contends with his uncle, but their battle ends when the gods gather at the approach of Darkness…
I am gonna serialise the poem in its 12 parts. Given the length (and sometimes formatting) of the individual parts, I am going to provide a free, downloadable PDF in each post, preceded by an excerpt.
In Wa-Set now he feels he’s closing in
on the mother with her infant icon.
This hunt that had unfolded ‘cross th’expanse
of Khemet’s reaches – from the northmost marsh
of the sprawling delta; southward he chased
past settlements, caravans, fortresses,
ports, ‘n cities; through Abdju, where he found
that Isis had built an Osirid shrine –
is close to its concluding throes, in which
the god Su-Tekh will end early the reign
of Horus, leaving Egypt’s throne for him!
Isis, Su-Tekh, & The Falcon-Child – coming soon…
william altoft 