Old King Tut

 

No, he wasn't old, at all, since he was a boy king, thought to have been 19 in 1324, B.C. when he died, having reigned for nine years. That was 3350 years ago, if one can fathom that time-frame, and in that sense it makes him old. But although chronologically he was not old when alive, physically his condition was that of an old man, having to get about with the use of a cane, and suffering severe degenerative conditions, along with a club foot.

He cannot have been too sprightly in the prime of his life, poor Tutankhamen. When his royal tomb was exhumed by Howard Carter in 1922, it was a sensation, because of the condition of the site, the splendour of the items found with him, and the exceedingly beautiful gold-worked death mask that topped his sarcophagus. The find was a sensational one awing the world, mesmerized by the legend of the boy king.

And the mystery of a curse said to have afflicted many in attendance at the excavation made everything surrounding the legend and the reality of King Tutankhamen a thrillingly fascinating discovery. Now, a team of scientists from Egypt, Italy and Germany making use of the most advanced DNA techniques has reached the conclusion that the king's physical disorders weakened his immune system making the health-vulnerable man susceptible to malarial-caused death.

His genetic endowments were grimly inappropriate for a long and healthy life. He is thought, through the tests, to have been the son of Akhenaten, the pharaoh whose paeons to the sun-god made him known to have been the first monotheist, and whose legacy of sacred buildings dedicated to Aten, the disc of the sun, were destroyed by those who followed him. The boy king's parents and grand-parents too have been identified.

Akhenaten was known to suffer from severe genetic problems caused by a disease that damages the body's connective tissues whose symptoms include a short torso, long head, neck, arms, hands and feet; pronounced collarbones, pot belly, heavy thighs and poor muscle tone. The six daughters he had with his wife Nefertiti all exhibited the same physical characteristics as their father. Unusually tall, likely to have weakened aortas easily ruptured leading to death.

Akhenaten never had artists copying his image for posterity alter his physique, and he was proud of the outstanding beauty of his wife Nefertiti. Nefertiti is thought also to have been a very close relative of her husband, further reasons why genetic problems surfaced in their offspring. Brother-sister marriages were common enough in early societies, particularly among royalty. Cleopatra was said to have married her brother.

Consanguinity in marriage does not produce healthy specimens; genetic vigour is irremediably impaired. Even much later, among European royalty throughout the later centuries up until the 18th Century, intermarriage in families was common. Charles Darwin, the great expositor of natural selection might have been thought to know better, but he married his first cousin, Emma Wedgwood.

King Tutankhamun's need of assistance in perambulation was verified by the discovery of over 130 walking sticks found in his tomb. The genetic tests recently completed, headed by the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo, concluded that his and perhaps four other mummies from his family were infected by a parasite causing an often-deadly form of malaria.

 

Inheriting Genetic Memory

It is an unspeakably vile thing to destroy

a soul with the vile contempt of viewing

human beings as commodities, dispensable

whose value lies in their usefulness to others

living devices lacking full humanity whose

lives and labour have the capacity to bring

leisure and riches to those who own them.

Little wonder that descendants of those who

were taken from Africa writhe in pain at the

inherited memory of suffering in the depraved

and obscene misuse of human lives tormented

enslaved, raped and deprived of their freedom.

There are those who deliberately fail to recognize

the magnitude of this venomous barbarism which

the enslaved of all ages were forced to endure

or perish.Yet there are others of ancient lineage

who well know and recognize this assault on

human dignity for what it is for they too have

suffered endlessly from antiquity to the present.

African slaves were traded for profit by other

African tribes, the intermediaries Arab slave

traders.Yet confoundingly these historical facts

of duplicity and cupidity are brushed aside in

favour of placing responsibility for historical

and current misery the inheritors of those bleak

memories prefer to believe were caused by that

other people whom history and human failure

have chosen to represent with the very traits

most held in contempt deserving of blame and

the violence of slander and misrepresentation.

Nightmares

So what is it then that we fear like 
children screaming in the dark of 
lurking monsters, when we find
ourselves immobilized and terrified
deep in the dungeon of a nightmare?
Is it the result of a collective inheritance
that has its genesis in our common
primordial memory that from time to
time surfaces prepared to drown our
cerebral foundation in a writhing pit
of serpents? How to explain our night-
wandering soul in a passage to some
places unknown by our minds leaving
us trembling and aghast? When beasts
slaver and pounce and we fear impending
death, recoiling from the danger and from
the message, relieved to finally awaken.
There was no wakening for those who
suffered the nightmare of human beasts
intent on extinguishing the lives of
Europe's Jews, not in a miasma of 
night horrors, but in an agonizing and
extended solution to cleanse Europe of
a human pestilence reduced to that
status by the overwhelming disinterest
that consumed minds of neighbours 
swiftly accustomed to witnessing familiar
families packed onto cattle cars pleading
for help only to see their neighbours
turn nonchalantly away since it was no
business of theirs, this ugly genocide.
In a fit of remorse the world vowed
that never again would such a horror
be mounted, and yet, and yet. In Europe
the moment is reborn and those who
espouse a re-enactment of the Holocaust
express so freely, carrying their signs
and shouting their slogans once again
of wholesale extermination. Time has
blurred the pity and compassion of
man's inhumanity to man, the victim
become the oppressor: death to Jews!

 

We Walk The Ancient Ground

Gulls swoop over blue water
shrilling at the cresting
rapids in the Ottawa River
and we stand before 
the memorial
the rusted figure 
of Father Brebeuf
crucifix in one hand
paddle resting on a canoe
in the other.
                   We travel an
Indian walkway, that place
where centuries past
portaging traders, missionaries
were brought by their guides
to skirt the rapids.
                    We walk
the ancient ground, the
granite of the Canadian shield
where sumacs, elms and
spindly poplar replace the
forest giants that once
furred this land.
                      Here,
sinkholes in the granite
and there, water laps
stone steps that Brule
and Champlain once climbed.

Across the river, Ottawa's bulks
and Gothic traceries of the
Parliament Buildings, but here,
eyes downcast and breathing creosote,
we follow the adventurers.

Blackbirds jaw their call
swallows arabesque the river
and bush grows close to the path
to shut off the present; the
rapids rush, playing us
the song their paddles heard.

Winter On The Ottawa River

Ice huts sit placidly prepared
for fishing over the ice-and-snow
blanketed Ottawa River benignly
bordering the capital city of Canada.
This is an immense waterway,
one of the watery giants of this
natural-resource-blessed country.

Where once sturdy voyageurs
determinedly began the history we
now barely recall, labouring mightily
to transport furs and virgin-cut
forests along its tumultuous length.

Where now towns and cities
flourish across provinces of
the founding nations. Ever at odds
over language and culture and
rare entitlements, whereas the river
knows its useful place in the
traditions of the country.

The mighty Chaudiere Rapids
harnessed for electrical energy
roil still though their vast power
has been constrained, stilled in
the interests of civilization's needs.
Lest we forget it references long
centuries-value of history.

Vast open stretches ripple
ferociously under the dark
winter sky, the water an angry
grey reflection of the upper
atmosphere that informs
its tempestuous temperament.

On the river's banks immense
old willows and elms spread
their dark, empty branches.
Crows soar the windless
pewter bowl of the lowering
winter sky. On its banks

sit the seat of government, the
country's Gothic-inspired
stone-mounted and Gargoyle-carved
edifice of the Parliament Buildings,
its clock tower steepling the sky.

Remembrance Day, 2009

National War Memorial

by jamieson

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. Thomas Jefferson, 1787.

From the disease-and-muck-laden trenches
the fearful misery, pain and suffering of
two world wars, the Korean conflict and now
the foreign ramparts of Afghanistan,
Canadian troops have responded to the cry of battle
for justice in the world. In the face of injustice
of atrocities whispered and deplored, Canada
responded. This response, our military history.

Now, at the armistice; the 11th hour of the
11th day of the 11th month, Canada mourns
the tragedy of human dissonance
in recalling the sacrificed lives of the young
and hale, the maimed and the heartbroken
returnees, who never again spoke of the
agony experienced, atrocities witnessed.
The deeply-scarred, the psychic misery
of nightmares lived, time refusing to
diminish their fearsome impact.

Canadians in all their generations
pay homage to those who lie in
Flanders Fields and beyond, wearing
the blood-red poppy of remembrance.
At the capital's War Memorial veterans,
garbed densely in musty uniforms, proudly
displaying medals glinting in the sun,
gather as war-experienced elders
greeted by their Chief of Staff, the country's
Prime Minister, as orders are called
for assembled regiments' response.

No wild wind this day, nor dark scudding clouds,
sleet or rain, nor snow to confront the
Silver Cross Mother of this year. The solemn
pomp and ceremony honours the nation's
young soldiers, diligent and courageous in war
and in peace. School children sing their choirs
of sweet lament and wistfully tragic hymns.
The focus of the nation on this sad
auspicious day commemorating a nation's
dedication to freedom, in honour of its heritage;
the country's reliance and gratitude toward
its sons and daughters who selflessly serve.

Blood-red poppies in grave abundance
will grace the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
speaking mutely yet volubly of Canadian
indebtedness to those who willingly
surrender themselves, steadfastly uphold
and defend values we hold fast and dear.

Each city, every town and hamlet
across this vast land, from the far reaches of
Nunavut, toward Newfoundland and stretching
over to British Columbia (ad mer a mer)
from sea to sea to sea, mount their
ceremonies of remembrance to our
dedicated fallen, those frail yet robust
survivors in a nation's grateful memory.

Oh Canada, We Stand on Guard For Thee.
Time shall not age them. We shall
remember them. This we vow to thee.
Universal liberty and justice, handmaidens
to human grace and triumph. Their valiant hearts
ever treasured memories. Peace ensured.
Rest in tranquility. Your sacrifice obligates
grateful memories, assures safety, security.
Your duty accomplished, ours to memorialize.

A Tale of Two Walls

Unexpectedly, spectacular in its bitter resolve
to remain there, squatting mercilessly
as the symbol of irreconcilability
it suddenly, miraculously imploded on itself
collapsing, leaving a host of dazzled,
confused, triumphant prisoners
to emerge, the light of freedom realized
settling into consciousness like the
heavens themselves revealed. Free at last.

Echoes of another, earlier release
from brutal bondage barely recognized,
memories of the living dead released
from death camps. How precise is this irony
that the murderously irenic-averse
population complicit with the annihilation
of the pestilential Jews among them
suffered themselves a dim shadow of the
relentlessly mortal agony of official genocide.

The cleansing of the community,
the nation, the continent and ultimately
the world, of the existence of predatory
power-assertive, controlling Jews.
Shakespeare would have thrilled to
this moral dilemma, the bleak humour,
the black destiny, the upheaval
and the clever disposal of so many
throwaway lives, from infants to
three-legged doddering babblers.

Yet another anniversary; that which presaged
the cruel turmoil, the incessant slaughter
signified by shards of gleaming glass, goes
yet unacknowledged. There are the usual
preliminary dark clouds gathering on the
endless horizon of man's inhumanity to its own.
Another Kristallnacht abetted by the demonic
slander that soils the atmosphere. Perish
the very thought! But all the symptoms, the
signposts point unerringly there.

The dissenters - all those whose livid hatred
of surviving world Jewry become now citizens
of their very own land, their sovereign country -
speak of their own truth; their resurgent bigotry
has found its very own theme to augment
The Protocols, with another wall of desperation.
This one separating not a single nation with
polarizing ideologies, but two separate nations
one of which designs to obliterate the other
while proclaiming itself the sad victim, the
other the evil damned-by-acclamation occupier.

Direly Disrupted, Disturbed, Damned

A malfunctioning house, in fact. This causes the head of the household great pain. He has always demonstrated great patience with his children, urging them to become all that they could possibly be. To ingrain in them the knowledge that they were gifted with free will, and that in recognition of this gift they had a responsibility to exercise their decision-making with intelligence and sensitivity. Basically, toward others.

This, they have not done. And the paterfamilias grieves. Heaven knows, he has tried. He has done his utmost to teach his children. His is a firm, even-handedly instructive method. He does, mind, demand respect, both for himself and his uncompromising values. There is right and there is, most decidedly, wrong, and the choice between the two cannot be compromised. He demands justice.

The father stands in judgement of his children, he exhorts them to conform, willingly, eagerly, to his edicts and commands. This is the responsibility of a father, to guide offspring reflecting the best that can possibly be, always aspiring to reach a pinnacle of highly developed sensibilities and respectful of the civil code their father has taught them.

Their father is also a strict disciplinarian. Although quite capable of compassion and loving kindness. So he says. When the occasion demands. The occasion, unfortunately, is too frequently demanding of discipline, to bring his errant children back to the path of the righteous way their father expects of them to tread with humility.

How can he be kind and loving when they insult his expectations for them? He mourns his children's growing propensity to bitterness between one another. Their constant fault-finding with one another. Most of all, it grieves him to see that child that was most gifted with original revelation of their father's divine presence, scorned and victimized and tormented by his brothers.

An unpleasing sight to a father wishful that his progeny behave as he would wish them to. All the more so that he has spent so much eternal time patiently attempting to teach them the way. They pretend to listen, then find innumerable reasons why that way is not amenable to their aspirations. Forgetting who it is that gave them life and opportunity.

Pity the father. His investment in humane instruction has gone awry.

Creation of Adam by Michelangelo

Sistine Chapel (Italian: Cappella Sistina) is the best-known chapel in the Apostolic

lost.and.found.eureka!

I, Rita Rosenfeld, do solemnly here swear (dammit) and attest, (gravely and honestly) that the following - all of the following hereinafter, blog entry by blog entry from this day hence - represent my modest contributions to the Canadian literary oeuvre.

I give witness on my own behalf that I am the sole creative force behind these literary constructions of poetry and short fiction. And that the publication sources cited, and the dates attributed, are correct and reliable.

And a one, and a two, and a - here goeth they forward...!

Apocrypha

In the beginning
there was chaos, but then a gregarious atom
encouraged a clubby atmosphere
where they all gathered and there was order.

At first there were hot gasses, but then
cool season prevailed and
minerals and metals crusted the fires.

One lone amoeba suffered incurable hubris;
thought she could do better
and founded a dynasty
on her vision.

In time a she-ape clambered down from the trees,
pointed at the sea, and declared 'there is my creatrix!'
Named her daughter Eve,

and set her the task of naming others. So Eve
chatted up giraffes and elephants,
whales and crickets. She called
a brash Adamai snake-in-the-grass

for offering her figs when she
couldn't give a damnation
for his ignorance. Everything
was fine until he learned to
wield a pen while she

continued to till the earth.
Eve provided crops for their
offspring and Adam pushed
back the night of eternity,
offering superiority and his

own rendering of ineffable truth:
That of himself as
Supreme Creator; half of him
up there, the other down here.

From: ...Bound Books
Samisdat, Volume 21, #3, 82nd release
Copyright, 1979, Rita Rosenfeld