The egg waits, nestled in silence.  Nothing but warm sunlight and occasional bits of falling dust have touched the shell since its deposit, a timeless interval to the embryo within.  But now it stirs, that tiny life becoming at last aware of a world without, which it must now join—for nature thrives upon new life.  It pokes its snout, then its entire head through the crust of North Africa, and as it struggles free it cries for its mother, who must be nearby, for who would abandon to the coldness of death a child who’d never done anybody harm?