POETRY

Papyrus Scrolls and Ships Delivered Hope across the Seas

Paper Poetry Prompt#1

When I think of Papyrus paper, ancient Egyptian scrolls come to mind. I’m fascinated by history and the knowledge that has been carefully passed down through generations. I imagine that all of us here on Medium would’ve been the papyri writers of that era, if we had lived during that period in history. We’ve learned so much about history because the people of that era found ways to put thoughts, knowledge and discoveries into writing.

The reason papyrus went out of style is due to its delicate nature and difficulty in preserving the scrolls. Some of the papyri had a shelf life that expired at around 200 years. Our ancestors saw that was insufficient to preserve written texts. They looked to the future and desired to find longer lasting methods to preserve texts. Because of their diligence, we have incredible resources available to us today. Now it’s up to us to look to the future and to try to leave our world better than we found it.

Papyrus is a soft green aquatic plant, which bears great significance to me. Being from a swampy area in Louisiana, I think of water as a representative of the flow of life. It travels from streams into oceans carrying life to and from distant lands. Papyrus reeds were also used in early production of boats and ships.

Papyrus paper delivered knowledge from distant lands and ancient times. Papyrus reed boats also delivered messages to distant lands in ancient times. As history shows us, these scrolls and boats carried a promise of hope.

Thor Heyerdahl had the brilliant idea of building papyrus reed boats in 1969 and 1970.

“The voyage of Ra begins with Thor Heyerdahl visiting Easter Island and discovering depictions of reed boats with masts and sails. He subsequently wanted to show that prehistoric civilizations, on both sides of the Atlantic, could have been in contact with each other by means of reed boats.” ~The Expedition — The Kon Tiki Museum

You can read more about the Kon Tiki journeys on Papyrus reed boats HERE. It’s an intriguing story of a group of people who sought to show the world that people from different nations and cultures could work in harmony under difficult conditions.

Papyrus in its simplest form is a plant. In its most complex form, it’s a bridge of communication in a world that longed to preserve knowledge, connection, and peace between ages of time and between nations of people. Perhaps we all could use some of that Papyrus floating hope in our world today.

Thank you Suntonu Bhadra for this exciting writing prompt: Papyrus I’ve thoroughly enjoyed writing on this topic!

The prompt requests that participants tag two writers who may be interested in the prompt. I’m tagging Tej and Priyanka Srivastava on this writing prompt: Papyrus