10,000 BCE Looms

Egypt, 10,000 BCE.

Gradually, the clenched fist of night loosens its chill grip. Slender rosy fingers of the dawn uncurl, stretching out across the ancient waters of the Nile.

A distant trumpet sounds; fugitive notes beyond the bonds of time.

An ibis lands near reeds by the river’s edge, the swish of its feathers gently ruffling the lazy water.

Excited light dances on a million streaming sequins as the liquid mirror surface quivers, a tingling skin bristling with expectation.

A sheet on a line billows in the soft Sahara breeze, furls into a rolling tunnel that undulates and flaps, a dragon’s tongue of silk lapping thirstily at the milky morning air: John Coltrane’s ‘Tunji’ hangs across the pulsating horizon, a wormhole portal shimmering through the reflective fabric of time.

In that still moment stands ibis-headed Thoth, keeper of all stories, dipping his pen-nib beak into the inky water to inscribe the secrets of the ages on leaves that fall from a riverbank tree.

The drum beats, carrying a half-forgotten memory from the Ancestors; it is the relay race of the human heartbeat from the dawn of time.

A hundred dreams ago from now a delta serenade spreads through that indigo echo. A golden barque looms out of the juddering heat, sailing us downstream to this, the age reflected in that rippling haze.