On first hearing your name, we might perceive
easy jobs. Not so in your ancient land
straddling the Nile like a prone miner, sleeve
and pant legs burrowing in, his free hand
stretching toward Egypt. Your sun-burnished earth
holds a kingdom of relics: vast goldworks,
settlements, Merowe’s pyramids worth
more to mankind than we’ll ever know. Weirs
soon will flood you, displacing native tribes
with a hundred-mile lake. You know, progress.
Archeologists, researchers and scribes,
meanwhile, salvage ruins under duress
as dam builders prep electricity,
always of more value than history.
Roger Armbrust
June 19, 2007
