Pictures from my most recent trip to Iunu, the temple of Hutheru. March 2024.
Every time i visit i think i leave crying… this recent time i wrote something in my notes on the drive back home. it’s not a very good piece of writing, fueled by blinding emotion.
A Lament for Dendera
O Hathor, Your temple is ruined.
The unfaithful walk in Your sanctuary,
Your pure place is filled with refuse.
Your high walls, these gleaming images,
are cracked and chipped away
by those who shall never comprehend
Your beauty, Your power.
Power here is held by the greedy,
who say I will let you in Her innermost shrine, for a price,
and the scholars misguide the pilgrims.
Lonely is Your shrine, with no gold,
with no lapis, with no carnelian, or turquoise.
The feet of the impure trod upon Your most hidden places,
and everywhere is the scent of absence and decay.
And the faithful, who come silently, are persecuted
Your followers are shamed and denigrated
as the lowest of beings,
by the keepers of Your temple.
Yet the lotus flower is still set in Your innermost shrine,
and prayers of Your praise and names are muttered
Quietly, in echoing halls,
once filled with priests of great devotion
and the fires of Your light.
The faithful come quietly
and bow in the shadow;
now a spectacle of humor
to the keepers and scholars of Your temple.
I leave my offerings and obeisances to You,
O Great Hathor,
whose shrine sits vacant and dim,
filled with singing birds
who fly through Your halls and nest within the walls.
I give my life and my heart to You,
O Beautiful Hathor,
whose temple is but a curiosity to the people of Your land,
who no longer know of Your glory
O Hathor, may You forever care for the birds of Your great temple,
may You forever tend to the cats who roam it’s halls.
May You halt the one who stops the songs of Your praise,
may You guide Your followers
to the gates of Your temple
and to Your vacant arms,
that gladly accept the joyous, and saddened, tears of the people.
^^^^^
Some personal thoughts:
Dendera is one of my favourite temples. Something always happens when i visit. The first time i went, i was able to sneak up onto the uppermost roof, where people used to come to sleep in hopes of being healed. This recent time i was greeted by a pregnant cat who curled up in my lap as i sang a hymn for our Lady Huther. i cried as she did. and, in one of the hidden crypts, i found someone had offered a lotus flower.
Unfortunately the experience is always tainted by people. “Guides” who want you to pay for things you don’t need to pay for. Who say you aren’t allowed to take photos, aren’t allowed to look at something or lie in the hypostyle hall and stare at the ceiling, without personally paying them. (You don’t have to pay them, they’re making it up, and they’ll go away if you tell them to fuck off. Or they will get the guy with the gun and then you have to pay both of them.) Then they lead you to the shrine room and tell you to touch the wall for ‘healing’. And there is a mark where the oil of everyone who listened to them touched, and it is degrading the paint and carvings. So i have a lot of detestation for such people. they upset my heart. and that is why i have written this lament. that is why i leave Dendera crying each time.
