The cold of the stars —
bright chips of ice
in a darkness almost complete
but many things must be said,
and I made myself to say them.
The cold of space, my dark arms
the frost of moons, my white feathers
how could Ra deny me? Were we not
equals, broken out of our own wombs
by the cosmic, unseen mother?

No. I saw her, felt for her,
while Ra ignored her. Arched over
the earth like a spangled scarf
the dun of her lover aching
toward her from the sands —
I don’t just write things down
to have a record of them. 
We know how that story ended
but I had to finesse a bit, gamble
a little, get past the arguments
of a senile god —

Or that is what I thought.
He relinquished the days to me
and so Nut and Geb were parents…
and the trouble started.
I suppose you could say
I outsmarted myself, and five
has always been an unlucky number.

But I always had the papyrus blossom
who was my wife, the one who watched over
the words that I wrote, the caretaker
of the love poems of the people
and the oaths of the angry gods. 
Sesheta is my blessing, another me
made more perfect by womanhood,
the watchful eye of the Word.
My solace when I doubt myself.

I rule over Chaos
my perfect order shot through
with dung and blood and terror —
nothing I had ever imagined.
So like a reluctant father
I rein Sutekh in when need be
his clashes with his better angels
and denial of it all so sour
That I retreat to the heavens
suck the ice chip stars 
to cool my anger,
swirl the blackness of the night
into an infinity of spiral arms

And retreat into my scrolls.
Humans, hold the world
so I no longer waste my writing time
with invective and fiery chains.
And when it gets to be too much
I spin my words into classes, teachers,
scrolls, illuminations
and watch the slow progression
of our peoples’ learning
and I guide the surgeon’s hand.

Before I sleep I drink the honey wine
of Abyssinia until its sweetness
crowds away the bitter taste
of pomegranate pith, the arils
bulging of pungent blood, and
the ale I share with Sekhmet.
Night is better than the day
and cooler than the Nile.

I lie in stardust with my wife
as the desert turns to black
and feline cries to battle
fade until another morn. 
I have always belonged
to the cosmos. My apologies
and prayers absorbed by darkness
until I rise again, each day,
and once more hold 
my words, my truth.

[Denise Dumars’ latest chapbook, Cajuns in Space, is currently nominated for the Elgin Award and her scifaiku “Holocene Park” is currently nominated for the Dwarf Stars award. She is also incredibly proud that her story, “Scrape,” appears in the HWA anthology, Other Terrors: An Inclusive Anthology. She is a Hierophant with the Fellowship of Isis, an international spiritual organization, where she serves Djehuti and other Egyptian deities in the Lyceum of Auset Hauhet.]