by Lisa Seidenberg
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| Left: Archaeologist Kathleen Martinez believes a marble statue discovered at a temple site portrays the face of Cleopatra. (Image courtesy Egypt Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities via Hyperallergic. Right: Researchers inspect the remains of a baby mammoth found in the Siberian permafrost in Russia's Batagaika crater. (Image by Roman Kutukov / Reuters via NBC News.) |
A female wooly mammoth was found
In the frozen reaches of the “mouth of hell”
Nestled in a crater underground
50,000 years since she made a sound
Did she leave with a tale to tell
Nestled in her crater underground?
She was named Yana, a gentle sound
We don’t know if she let out a yell
Stumbled down by chance or forced underground
Cleopatra’s stone head was found uncrowned
Along with coins and other bagatelles
Scattered near her tomb recovered underground
Burial sites are a scientist’s playground
Clues in bones, a grown-up show and tell
Treasures from an ancient lost and found
Might the wooly beast and the Egyptian Queen
prefer their secrets to remain unseen?
Safe-keeping their private lives
Locked away from prying eyes
Lisa Seidenberg is a writer and filmmaker who resides in coastal Connecticut. She is a nominee for the 2025 Pushcart Prize. Her recent work has been published in Asymptote Journal, The New Verse News, OneArt: A Journal of Poetry, and Gyroscope Review. She is peer poetry reviewer for Whale Road Review.
