Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Ritual of Not Letting His Heart Be Carried Off


My heart, my mother. My heart, my mother. My heart of my becoming. My heart dreams in the house of hearts. My heart sleeps in the house of hearts. My heart ticks in my chest like a beetle. The night waits, still I hear its beating. It resonates like a bow string of an archer. It hums like the string of a lyre.

Love. Love. Give me love, sibilant love, thundering love!


It is myself that speaks to my heart, my ka, my double.

The heart leaps and answers to its name. It's words are the deeds of my body. It's deed have been my own thoughts, its blood the fluid of gods, river of joy and sadness. My heart leaps like a fish in water.

Do not carry off my heart. Do not cut me from my heart.


-The Egyptian Book of the Dead

Normandy Ellis, p.118