Read Poem: Egypt’s Shifting Sands by Helen Whitten

I’ve stood in Tahrir Square,
felt the dusty heat,
done deals on street corners
with scruffy boys
adept at currency arithmetic,
seen the Pyramids at sunset
after the inevitable visit to a papyrus shop,

taken a horse
into the desolate desert at dusk,
just me and a stranger,
hoof meeting sand at speed,
watched a solitary camel rider leering up
like a mirage from the tombs,
grabbing at my reins,
his smile lecherous as a snake.
The Sphinx watched it all.

And Tahrir Square that spring
was full of banners,
no Pharoah there,
no Rameses nor Akhenaton,
just families gathering,
and a herd of colts
kicking their heels,
booting out the old folk.

Danton and Havel
on ghostly watch
as a velvet wave upturns
the status quo along
the banks of the glittering Nile,
centuries of despotic old men’s decrees
unravelling like papyrus
from Tunisia to Syria.

Today, parched bones…