Snofru the Mad

One of the oddest-sounding names for a ruler (at least to English ears) is the Egyptian "Snofru." My poem starts with a child's embarrassment about the sound of his name, and leads to more and more outre and outrageous obsessions. This is a fantasy, of course, but grounded in an obscure chapter in Egyptian history.

Snofru or Snefru was Pharaoh in the Fourth Dynasty and the immediate predecessor of Khufu (Cheops), builder of the Great Pyramid. Historians are baffled as to why Snofru built himself three separate pyramids. Snofru was the first Pharaoh to enclose his name in a cartouche on monuments.

SNOFRU THE MAD

With a name like Snofru

you’d better be good

as a Pharaoh, as a survivor.

Would the gods laugh, he wondered,

when his weighing time came up —

his heart against a feather

on the fatal balance —

would tittering among them

make his recitation falter?

A careful planner,

he lays four boats in his pyramid,

one pointed in each direction —

he’d launch all four

so his soul could elude

the pursuing god Set

and confound old Ammit,

the Eater of the Dead.

Grave robbers? He’d baffle them,

build three great pyramids

for Snofru the Pharaoh —

hang the cost!

He’d bury an imposter

in each sarcophagus.

The gods alone would know

his final resting place,

a well-appointed tomb

whose architect he’d strangled.

As for his Queen Hetephras,

dead these three years now,

he left her innards

in an alabaster jar,

yet carried her mummy away.

Nights, he unwinds her wrappings,

kisses her natron-scented lips,

caresses her sewn-up belly,

then carefully restores

her royal bandages,

her mask and jewels.

His courtiers avoid him,

smell death despite

the unguents and incense.

An impudent general

already makes eyes

at his daughter. They shceme.

There is talk, there is talk.

He will neither make war, nor peace,

turns back ambassadors

as he spends his days divining

how to turn his eye-blink life

into the gods’ eternity.

One night he slips away.

The upstart will assume his name,

bed his black-eyed daughter,

inherit his unused pyramid —

the better to advance his stratagem.

With pride and pomp

he circled his name

on a hundred monuments,

but he is far from Memphis now,

where he speaks to his servants

in but a whisper.

His modest sarcophagus,

when that time comes,

is inscribed with another name.

His journey West

will be uneventful.

Then, coming and going

among the living the dead,

he’ll watch as the proud

are judged and eaten,

then take his place, unsandaled,

plain as the commonest slave,

serving his mummy-bride

at the table of the gods.