Gilgamesh and Enkidu: Friendship On The Battlefield
Late last night, I was rereading Herbert Mason’s translation of the ancient Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh
He looked at Gilgamesh, and said:
You will be left alone, unable to understand
In a world where nothing lives anymore
As you thought it did.
Nothing like yourself, everything like dead
Clay before the river makes the plants
Burst out along its beds, dead and …
He became bitter in his tone again:
Because of her. She made me see
Things as a man, and a man sees death in things.
That is what it is like to be a man. You’ll know
When you have lost the strength to see
The way you once did. You’ll be alone and wander
Eternal life you have to find.
He drew closer to his friends face.
My pain is that my eyes and ears
No longer see and hear the same
As yours do. Your eyes have changed.
You are crying. You never cried before.
It’s not like you.
Why am I to die,
You to wander on alone?
Is that the way it is with friends?Gilgamesh sat hushed as his friend’s eyes stilled.
In his silence he reached out
To touch the friend whom he had lost. …
