To some twas a majestic force,
Mysterious and beautiful,
Courageous and never full
From a vast, adventurous feast.
It roamed – a horn upon a horse,
A gallop one could never cull,
It thought itself invincible,
Yet to some it was a beast.

Its orchestra – a masterpiece
Assembled from around the Earth,
But labouring perfections birth
Was a harpist’s absent beat.
The pains of searching now could cease
As landing upon emerald berth,
The unicorn unearthed its serf
As sublimity filled that seat.

The harpist liked her homely scene,
Despite its audience so small.
She’d rather stay than leave it all
And face the unicorns stampede.
And so she suffered wrath obscene:
She was forced to attend the ball,
Waiting centuries for the call
To leave an orchestra based on greed.

In present day the harp is home,
Back to where it is meant to be,
Beauty played independently,
But the unicorn does not mourn,
For now both creatures often roam
To a ball outside of history
And play a peaceful melody:
“The Harpist and the Unicorn.”

Musings at Giza
by Michael R. Burch

In deepening pools of shadows lies
the Sphinx, and men still fear his eyes.
Though centuries have passed, he waits.
Egyptians gather at the gates.

Great pyramids, the looted tombs
—how still and desolate their wombs!—
await sarcophagi of kings.
From eons past, a hammer rings.

Was Cleopatra's litter borne
along these streets now bleak, forlorn?
Did Pharaohs clad in purple ride
fierce stallions through a human tide?

Did Bocchoris here mete his law
from distant Kush to Saqqarah?
or Tutankhamen here once smile
upon the children of the Nile?

or Nefertiti ever rise
with wild abandon in her eyes
to gaze across this arid plain
and cry, “Great Isis, live again!”

Published by Golden Isis and The Eclectic Muse

Keywords/Tags: Ancient, Egypt, Giza, Sphinx, pyramids, tombs, sarcophagi, Cleopatra, pharaohs, Bocchoris, Kush, Saqqarah, Tutankhamen, Nile, Nefertiti, Isis



ANCIENT EGYPTIAN POETRY TRANSLATIONS

These are my modern English translations of ancient Egyptian poems, love lyrics and Harper's songs.

An Ancient Egyptian Love Lyric (circa 1085-570 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Is there anything sweeter than these hours of love,
when we're together, and my heart races?
For what is better than embracing and fondling
when you visit me and we surrender to delights?

If you reach to caress my thigh,
I will offer you my breast also —
it's soft; it won't jab you or ****** you away!

Will you leave me because you're hungry?
Are you ruled by your belly?
Will you leave me because you need something to wear?
I have chests full of fine linen!
Will you leave me because you're thirsty?
Here, **** my *******! They're full to overflowing, and all for you!

I glory in the hours of our embracings;
my joy is incalculable!

The thrill of your love spreads through my body
like honey in water,
like a drug mixed with spices,
like wine mingled with water.

Oh, that you would speed to see your sister
like a stallion in heat, like a bull to his heifer!
For the heavens have granted us love like flames igniting straw,
desire like the falcon's free-falling frenzy!



Egyptian Love Song
(circa the 13th or 14th century BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Lover, let’s slip down to the pond;
I’ll bathe while you watch me from the nearest bank.
I’ll wear my sexiest swimsuit, just for you,
made of sheer linen, fit for a princess!
Come, see how it looks when it’s wet!
Can I coax you to wade in with me?
To let the cool water surround us?
Then I’ll dive way down deep, just for you,
and come up dripping,
letting you feast your eyes
on the little pink fish I’ve found.
Then I’ll say, standing there in the shallows:
"Look at my little pink fish, love,
as I hold it in my hand.
See how my fingers caress it,
slipping down its sides, then inside!
See how it wiggles?"
But then I’ll giggle softly and sigh,
my eyes bright with your seeing:
It’s a gift, my love, no more words!
Come closer and see ...
it’s all me!



Ancient Egyptian Harper’s Songs

The first carpe diem or "seize the day" poems may be the various versions of the ancient Egyptian "Harper's Song" (or "Song of the Harper"). These may also be the oldest "ubi sunt" or "where are they now" poems. Such poems were inscribed in Egyptian tombs along with the image of a blind man playing a harp. Thus it is believed these were songs performed during funeral services for the deceased. Versions of the "Harper's Song" found in tombs of the Old Kingdom (c. 2686-2181 BC) tend to be short and traditional in regard to the afterlife (i.e., affirmative). Middle Kingdom (c. 2055-1786 BC) and New Kingdom (1539-1075 BC) versions tend to be longer and sometimes encourage listeners to "seize the day" while rejecting the more traditional Egyptian view of eternity (for instance, satirizing large funerary monuments and saying possessions cannot be taken into the afterlife). Such updated versions of the "Harper's Song" include "Harper's Song: Tomb of Neferhotep" and " Harper's Song: Tomb of Inherkhawy." These are my personal favorites of both genres ...

This song comes from a tomb which contains an image of Djehutiemheb and Hedjmetmut seated at an offering table while their son, dressed as a priest, pours libations and burning incense before them. It seems the song may be a blessing being voiced by the son, as the text appears before his representation.

Harper's Song: Tomb of Djehutiemheb
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

... The sky is opened for you,
the earth opened for you,
for you the good path leads into the Necropolis.
You enter and exit like Re.
You stride unhindered like the Lords of Eternity ...



This song from the funerary stela of Iki depicts the deceased sitting at an offering table with his wife, with the rotund harpist Neferhotep sitting on the other side of the table. Neferhotep was one of the earliest known Egyptian singer/harpists. His portrait and his song were included on the stela of a man named Iki.

Harper's Song: Tomb of Iki
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

O tomb, you were prepared for a festival,
your foundations anchored in happiness!
The harpist Neferhotep, son of Henu.

*

The stela of Nebankh from Abydos contains a Harper's Song with the deceased depicted sitting at an offering table with the harpist squatting before him:

Harper's Song: Tomb of Nebankh
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Tjeniaa the singer says:
Now you are seated securely in eternity,
in your eternal monument!
Your tomb is filled with food-offerings
and complete with every fitting thing.
Your soul is with you
and will never desert you,
Royal Treasurer and Seal-Bearer, Nebankh!
The sweet north wind is now your breath!
So says the honorable singer Tjeniaa,
whom he loved and who keeps his name alive
by singing to his soul every day.



Interestingly, the three Harper's songs found in the tomb of the priest Neferhotep seem to display very different viewpoints about the afterlife, if we can take the first two to be saying that death is peaceful because no one is doing anything ...

Harper's Song: Tomb of Neferhotep
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I.
I have heard songs inscribed in ancient tombs,
extolling earth-life while belittling the Beyond ...
but why condemn the kingdom of Eternity,
the just and the fair,
which holds no terrors?

II.
Death abhors violence: no man there arms himself against his brother.
No one rebels in that peaceful kingdom.
All our ancestors rest there, since man’s earliest days;
the multitudes assemble there, every one,
for none may tarry overlong in the land of Egypt.
There is no one who will not cross over.

III.
Earth-life is no more than the span of a dream,
but fair welcomes are given when one reaches the West.



Harper's Song: Tomb of Intef
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

(from the tomb of the Pharaoh Intef)

Here lies a happy prince
because death is the kindest fate.

One generation passes, another remains:
so it has been since our eldest ancestors.

Now those who were once "gods" rest in their sepulchers
along with other nobles
and those who built their tombs.

Their palaces are gone,
and what has become of them?

What of the words of Imhotep and Hardedef,
whose sayings are still recited entire?

What of their palaces?
Their walls have collapsed into ruins,
their halls have vanished
as if they never existed!

And no one returns from that realm
to inform us of their state
or to calm our fears.
We remain in the dark until we join them ...

Hence, rejoice with happy hearts!
It is best to forget: heedlessness is happiness!
Humor your hearts as long as you live!

Perfume your hair with myrrh,
adorn yourself in your finest linens,
anoint yourself with the costliest oils, fit for a god,
heap up your treasures here on earth!

Let your heart remain buoyant! Don't let it sink!
Humor your heart and find happiness!
Here on earth, do as your heart demands!

What use is mourning,
when weary-hearted Osiris pays tears no heed?

Weeping and wailing spares no man from the grave,
so make every day your holiday. Never tire of joy's pursuits!
Because no one is allowed to take his possessions with him
and none who departs ever returns!

This song, also known as “The Lay of the Harper,” appears in the tomb of Paatenemheb, where the introductory line says it was copied from the tomb of a King Intef (a name used by several kings from 11th and 17th dynasties). The poem is also preserved in the Ramesside New Kingdom Harris 500 papyrus. These works are accepted by scholars as being a copy of a genuine Middle Kingdom text.

Keywords/Tags: Egypt, Egyptian, poem, poems, poetry, translation, translations, English, harper, harpers songs, love poems, love songs, love lyrics

A View from a Valley Well

As I drew from your valley well .......waters sweet last night

My eyes were transfixed on your ******* ***** and tight

Your fingers like the harpist lost in song
Were dancing upon these pink peaks so long

Beyond these matching minarets
My eyes espied your round ruby lips

These labials lisped that eternal sacred love song of the bed

Captivating is the view from your valley to your head

One gorgeous Spring day
we gathered on my deck,
a few friends and I,
to sing and play
some beautiful music
loved by us all.

My home, on a remote ridge top
of the Sierra mountains,
offered a panoramic view.
Not a single house
could be seen--
only the vast forest
surrounded us.

We accompanied our voices
with two guitars,
a flute, and a
small harp.

As we sang,
the air grew still,
and the tall, fragrant pines
encircling the house
seemed to lean in,
listening.

After awhile we paused,
to savor in silence
the sublime feeling
created by the music.
The harpist stood her harp
on the table.

Just then,
a gentle breeze came up
and the harp began to sing
as the wind's fingers
caressed the strings,
enchanting us all
with a heavenly music
unlike anything
we had ever heard.

Would that my heart
were as that harp,
responsive to
Your lightest touch--
singing endlessly
of love.

Tonight I have no words.
I cannot grandly sweep my pen
In flowing arcs across the page,
Drawing little soft impressions
(little soft depressions)
That show how lovely pain can be.
I cannot play the great Creator
Who rips a vital pulsing mass
from out His chest,
And molds still-beating clay
With a sad old potter’s gentle hands
into a little melancholic harpist
who plucks the heartstrings perfectly.

No, I have no words that fit
Like others have made fit before,
composing language to fit all the inward lines and curves
(I once knew a few of her’s)
that twist and turn and come entwined,
(the twists and turns of long ago)
crying “Lacrimosa!” in some wee hour
as the breeze blows a lacy curtain back.
I am no Aeolian instrument
Sounding a sweet ethereal chord into the night.
I am the vacuous breath left behind in silence
When the musician’s music stops —
A tuneless referent —
An empty exclamation mark
Howling noiselessly in space,
Meaning nothing
And everything, all the same.

!

The lotus, I choose the lotus!
The ebb and flow the shore it goads us
Static focus, a layer peeled off and cast aside
The tide it whispered it spoke to me
but I turned I looked the other way
Upwards roads and downwards roads
Set the rock aside Sisyphus,
Bear the weight no more
Stare in lost, in vacant eyes at a boatless shore
The lotus, I choose the lotus

Wayward streams, down and around it floats us
And spits us out,
Our isolated Elysium or tortured chamber
It’s a matter of where you spend your days, in or out
On what you rest your eyes upon,
The whirlwind, the spinning cannon
Fates bolt it shoots us in twirling spiral
And all along from the corner lit dim
Float the soft tunes of a harpist,
Deft fingers pluck the taught strings,
And her eyes overcast, cloudy grey
Stare vacantly out like person drowned

The lotus, I choose the lotus!
The sweet nectar it covers it soothes me
Puzzled pieces glue me, paste me together
Pluck me, toss me, say that I flew
Let’s play who knows who
Be honest who really knows you
Reflection from the lake,
a familiar face it greets me
Whirlpool tides, how they rip they pull us
Oh the lotus, give me the lotus!

hey harpist with the stringy fingers
pluck me some melody made of daydreams
serenade my sleepless soul into
an ethereal pool where bodies are not needed
let each note pronounce as though to
declare the highest of high with sunshine
emanating through the vibrations of blissful contact
ripple love my way as though it could be shaped
so that I may know rest in peace

recursive tones in melodic notes of
healing.
just your own to listen, instead of to be heard.
hypnotic colorful tessalation, crafted in fugue, filling your mind with ease.
do not fear, the origin: benevolence.
alas reflections of shadows constructing fractions of the source of fractions of remnance of the whole.
Just enough truth, with trust, is a gift from the creator.

There was time my mind was yours,
But my heart is yours regardless,
The beats defined a music sheet and you played me like a harpist.

The score settled like rose petals in the essence of the tarnished
The stems remained like overtures,
And that's where it all started.

You blossomed in the minus key,
Your golden touch was midas
The treasure crept in semi clefts,
The breath I took was harnessed.

I played the jester to your beat
And bowed to you my highness.


You took my crown and held me down
The curtains closed in darkness.

Sitting packed in the back
of a semi-decrepit white Subaru
belonging to the Swedish Harpist
driven by the Romanian Drummer
with a literal car-full
of perfectly tetrised musical instruments,
including:

Four cymbals, two toms, a hi-hat, and a stool,
a Celtic double-Harp,
an electric Piano,
and two guitars
(an acoustic-electric twelve-string and an electric six-string)
with a few days' clothing
and, not knowing where we're sleeping, a sleeping bag,
all the while
devouring Matza and pumpkin seeds
(that we bought at Trader Joe's)
as we barrel moderately safely
down various back roads and Highways
in this car weighted as a truck and driven as a motorcycle
towards enigmatic San Francisco
to play a couple shows,
two days in a row:

one, at a literally underground Theatre
(in which improv comedy is, apparently, king of kings)
smack-dab 'pon the border of Union Square,
and another, for a private birthday party
typified by oh so many avid Burners.

Surely, our Psychedelic Jazz Funk-Rock
will find some empathic ears!

Y'know, last summer,
when I said I wanted
to be in a Gypsy Band,
I sure didn't see this coming:
this is pretty ******* Gypsy,
in my observational opinion.

Well,
here I am,
and I even asked for it.

For us three,
this will certainly be
an interesting few days,
down in the Bay,
on our way to play
wherever it is we may,
and all I can say
is: "Okay,
this is the stuff
books are made of,"
and, "Well,
time to live
one hell of a story!"

"Dear Diary"* I wrote at the top of the page. I've turned to these wretched pages because I have no one else to turn to.

I have been wanting to runaway for sometime now. I have an estranged sense of nostalgia towards places I haven't even been to.                

Did you know that you shattered my heart? That a shard of ***** lacerated my ribcage? & so I've concluded...

That perhaps one day, when I'm 22, I will cut my hair short and runaway to new york and try to find a big sweet apple they've always talked about.                 

I will disregard my birth name and I will end up telling everyone I meet that my name is Aphrodite, but I am not greek nor am I a lover. I'll write poetry. The good poetry and the bad poetry. I'll write poetry the way you called your quits, blank eyed and confusing. And may the next person to make my heart glow, be just as kind as you, minus the volatility, equivalent charms.  
Laugh as sentimental as 100yr old harpist.
Smile as transfixing as a dim star, on a moonless night
Eye's as beautiful as the sun..

But just as the sun, I never could stare to long.

[2008, age 13]
Dear Self,

Are you here today?
The same person I am
from your younger's same
If you are here, then yes,
it is you and it is I

We are the same
and different

You are probably
a musician, an artist,
or someone who works
with their hands.

a poet, a harpist,
a person interested
in the fiber arts.

Either way,
we like what we do
and we want to do it

You traveled back
with advice and a
message

Keep this still
and think of it always

I wished you good fortune,
and I truly hope
it has fallen to you.

From,
Thineself

p.s.
Remember
The Rock

Let me be the angel
That guides you into joy.
Let the pulsing of my heart
Be your only noise.

Let me be the harpist
That strums away your pain.
Let me be the poet
That bleeds stanzas in your name.

Let my hands be your only
Escape into release.
Let this love of mine
Bring you inner peace.

And if you are to weep,
Let me wipe away your tears.
And if you ever cower,
Let me eliminate your fears.

She is the most attentive person
That I know. So I am winking
At her.

I do not really know
Which star at night
Reminded me of her
Just like before.
Sirius, Rigel, Vega, Aldebaran--
I do not recall a star that--
That does not look back,
She cannot see me anymore,
Just looking, staring at her,
This way. God,
She's so beautiful.

She is the harpist of my life.
She feels more than ever.
She longs for shapes, sizes, and textures.
What a cute baby...
Her hand is fond
Of my hand, memorizing
The intricate lines and features,
Telling my future.
You can tell what she really is.
She smiles despite of.

She is literally wind, monsoon,
Literal dark and light,
A soul, a window.
She is literally blind.
She is literally love.

She is the most attentive love
That I know.*

© 2014 J.S.P.

Gloomy on sunny days
Shadows not a house or tree
Looming through every phrase
These shadows stick very close to me

Hell as far as the eye can see
Hell as dark as an ocean's deep
Hell as my new reality
Hell as a sacrilegious promise I
Couldn't keep

"Promises man I promised"
                                      I offer my soul for you
                                                         to harvest

"Promises man I promised"
                              Allow my words to become
                                                   your harness

"Promises man I promised"
                                 Crossed my heart but lets
                                                          b­e honest

"Promises man I promised"
                               Then let you plunge to the
                                         depths of darkness

"Promises man I promised"
                    Then these shadows crept inside
                                                   my conscious

"Promises man I promised"
                  It's hard to feel love when feeling
                                                oh so heartless

"Promises man I promised"
                Your love sang I wouldn't dare ****
                                                       the harpist

"Promises man I PROMISE"
         My words will sing love back this time
                                                       *as an artist

"It ain't easy being green."
It ain't easy being the wrong
Type of guy to be.
But I laugh in the face of the
People who strive to take the love
Of self away from me.
I am multifaceted,
A harpist, poet, artist, a Christian.
An engineer, dancer, dreamer of fantastic,
Writer, fiction nerd, a fighting man.
A Black man, mixed with Irish and Cuban.
And I refuse to give up my beliefs,
I'm different, odd and flamboyant. Peculiarities I protect with tenacity.
No it ain't easy being green.
But better to strive being me.

in the song of robin and blackbird
Creator signs His Name
A name that can be seen and heard
by those who shun acclaim

in the work of scribe and artist
shines the inner being
in the music of drum or harpist
speaks the soul all-seeing

in the works o' nefarious schemer
in darkest destruction 'n death
in the silence that shouts like screamer
in absence of life-giving breath

walks the many-faced serpent schemer
for those with eyes to see
the signature of the anti-redeemer
antithesis of eternity

for every person stamps their name
in the deeds they do
igniting hellish fires 'n flame
or letting G-d shine through

so don't be flummoxed by this world
keep your eyes on your goal
for as cherry, almond, or walnut burled
your acts bespeak your soul

Do not let the faces fool you.
Every bump in the night,
May be the cruel figments of your mind
Hoping to ignite the illusion
of utter insanity.

Do not for one second
Believe in the spine-chilling moans
that seem to leak from every unsightly crevice
of your disfigured thoughts.  

Do not allow yourself
To slip from the serrated edge of sanity,
Even for a fleeting moment.
For the comfort is short-lived,
And the ***** is endless.

Do not stare too long
At the scorched bodies of men,
Contorted into the soot covered demons
That will unfailingly materialize
In your loneliness.

Do not take the threats,
Which echo in the
Impenetrable darkness,
lightly.
They are the fabrication
of your own self destruction.

Do not think
They won’t bury you alive,
Every chance they get.
Leaving the decaying scent
of wilting roses atop the mounds of dirt.
Where they will scrawl your name in haste
across a grimy tombstone.

Do net let
The voices sway you into madness.
For they will play your vulnerability
with the fingers of a skilled harpist.
Leaving you so intoxicated
with the sweet melody
that you will believe you asked for
your own demise.


Do not forget the flimsy nature
of your deteriorating mind,
when appealing whispers
begin to ring in your ears.
They are merely hoping
to glimpse your downfall.


Remember,
not to let them get the best of you.
that if you find anything salvageable
In the chaos inside your head,
or the tsunami inside your heart.
Grasp onto the little beam of hope,
and begin putting yourself
back together.

A moment passes and something beautiful dies,
there were watercolor constellations,
dappled, darkling gems of light,
behind us, glinting in jasper, and violet skies,
but now only darkness,
the constellations in silent splendor,
bleeding fire from my eyes,
the constellations of
diamonds have fallen,
and once where my heart found laughter,
only tears remain,
and once in silence I trusted-
such deep hopes!
Higher than all before them,
a daredevil on the wire!
Now a ball of fire,
forward motion, now sinking in those hopes,
slowly tangled by the noose of their ropes,
you would think after a year or so,
one could let go, let go!
And how?
I don't know-
how to express that
yesterday is a slave to tomorrow,
for we have taken what was not ours to borrow,
the wicked borrow and do not repay,
that has become our culture, this our way,
"even in laughter the heart may sorrow"
so how does this story end?
It ends with a whimper,
and mangled hopes,
a harpist's hand severed in the machine,
a dreamer crushed within a dream.
The sad singer with his tongue severed,
can never speak out,
can only scream,
a dreamer crushed within a dream.
-dm (c) 2015

I did not realize soon enough that I wanted to be someone else, not somewhere else.

I thought I could not bear people (I am not enough for people),

but after all the beauty I have seen...

All the hallowed halls,

all the remnants left
by those now centuries gone--

they are not worth a single living thing.

A harp without a harpist
is just a confusion of strings.

And there is no grandeur we can create
that will ever take our place.

I am saying it could all be ashes
if you leave.

If to be loved
Feels like tugging on sinew
The way a lazy harpist plucks her strings.

If to be loved
Tastes like bitter wine and sweet dirt.

If to be loved
Is like holding a shard of glass between your teeth
While jumping on a tight rope,
Then I will not have it.

If to be loved
Means learning to love...

Then I publicly refuse this offer.
And I return to the life I used to lead.
Caked in grey and devoid of warmth

So unlike the unbearable heat of your skin
When you wake me with lips on a hot summer's night
And I cannot muster the strength to push you away.
So by your hair I pull you near
And that scream I feel from deep in my gut will
Not make its way to my vocal chords.

I refuse to love anyone again.
Especially one as impermanent as you.

Somewhere a harpist
plucks gently at my
strings and
weeps.