𓂀 Letter to the West
In honor of my heart’s brother, my friend, my other self, Cyril,
born on the 28th day of the Month of Balance,
who rose to the Horizon on the 31st day of the Month of Fields (May) in the year 2024.
I am she who writes in the light of morning,
she whose heart is heavy and whose hands are full of silence.
I am Laurence Isiphentys Nephtymen Nebetou,
born on the fifth day of the following month, beneath the same weight of stars.
I write from the house of the living to you,
beloved among the glorified,
you who now walk among the justified dead,
under the protection of Wesir, Lord of the West.
O you, good man, faithful friend,
to whom I spoke without words,
whom I understood without explanation.
I place these words as an offering of fine linen and myrrh,
like cool water poured into the bowl of the ancestors at the rising of Ra.
May they be a balm for your name,
may they be a bridge for my heart.
You were my silent support,
the pillar that did not shake, even when storms raged within me.
You knew. Always, you knew.
Without a glance, without a word, you read my soul.
As if there were an invisible thread woven between your flesh and my breath.
For twenty-five years, you were the calm in my tumult.
And now that you have gone to the Horizon,
and your body rests beneath fresh earth,
I stand upright, but hollow-hearted.
For no one told me, no one warned me.
It was by the one who shared your bed that I learned.
And that silence from others was another death.
But I do not curse. I do not shout.
I write to you. For the dead do not truly die,
so long as their names are spoken aloud,
and so long as they are remembered with love.
So receive this offering:
a thousand loaves of bread and a thousand jugs of beer,
a thousand cattle and a thousand birds,
a thousand alabaster jars filled with sweet oil,
a thousand perfumed cloths,
and all the good things upon which an akh might live.
May your heart be light upon the scales of Ma’at,
and may your soul shine among the imperishable stars.
I write to you in the language of the living,
and I place my words into the clay of memory.
You still live, Cyril. You live as long as I do.
Peace to you in the Blessed West.
Walk in beauty in the Fields of Iaru,
knowing that love endures,
even between the world