by Julia Griffin

“Ancient Egyptian pleasure boat found by archaeologists off Alexandria coast:
First-century luxury vessel matches description by the Greek historian Strabo, who visited city around 29-25BC … Strabo had visited the Egyptian city around 29-25BC and wrote of such boats: ‘These vessels are luxuriously fitted out and used by the royal court for excursions; and the crowd of revellers who go down from Alexandria by the canal to the public festivals; for every day and every night is crowded with people on the boats who play the flute and dance without restraint and with extreme licentiousness.'”
—The Guardian

The barge she sat in once was gone long since;
The water cooled; the golden prow stripped bare,
Splintered and rotted; the delicious hints
Of perfume melted into air, thin air.
“Extreme licentiousness!” old Strabo wrote
(He had not been invited); “revelry
Without restraint!” No more: the glowing boat
Seemed cold as Caesar’s monument. But see:
Today once more the waves begin to swell;
Soft, purple echoes, surfacing, recall
The stroking oars, the ancient serpent’s spell
That beggars all description (nearly all);
And there she sits, commanding at a touch:
If it be love indeed, tell me how much …