Gamal al-Ghitani: Pyramid Texts
between east and west.
She appears to him who is patient, who strives, struggles, exhausts himself, and thus becomes empowered. Her appointed hour never changes, her appearance being simultaneous with the sudden swelling of that music that comes from no source, from a place that can be neither identified nor delimited.
None sees her but he to whom has been given the capacity …to withstand yearning and grief, to suppress his sighs. And the greater the effort made, the greater the clarity of the vision, so that the empowered can make out her royal features, peer through the opening of her lips, seek shelter in the corners of her eyes, forever trained on the point at which the sun sets.
Melodies arise from her and surround her, melodies hard to analyze, neither of strings nor of wind nor of brass. As their rhythms complete their pattern, the four directions sway, the edges of the universe draw close to one another, the revolution of the upper firmament is ordered.
He who perseveres can see her agile, mighty figure ascending into the void, and observe the universal femininity of hers, a part of which the adoring, love-sick sculptor strove to capture in his statue for all to see.
The pure in heart can see the start of her dance, her ascent, when she casts wide her lines and draws them back, extends them and gathers them, at the moment when her body adjusts the melodies, accentuates the rhythms, and transmits them to the furthest ends of existence. Any walking his road, or dwelling in his home, may see her with his own eyes so long as he turns with his whole being toward her. At that moment when the sunset is drawing to a close, her turning begins, increasing in speed till it becomes difficult for the human gaze to grasp her. She is transformed into a point, into a setting star, too marvelous to ignore and too mysterious to comprehend.
–Gamal al-Ghitani, Pyramid Texts
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