{"product_id":"gilgamesh-isbn-9781400077335","title":"Gilgamesh","description":"In his thrillingly contemporary retelling of the world’s oldest epic, award-winning poet Derrek Hines brings us as close as we may ever come to re-creating the power it had over its original listeners more than four thousand years ago in the ancient Near East.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGilgamesh, the semi-divine ruler of Uruk, is a larger-than-life bully and abuser of his people. In order to tame the arrogant king, the gods create the wild and handsome Enkidu. But after Enkidu and Gilgamesh become fast friends, they defy the gods in a series of outsized adventures that brings Gilgamesh face to face with both loss and death itself. Hines energizes this timeless tale with vivid and electrifyingly modern images, from the goddess Ishtar cracking the sound barrier, to a battlefield nightmare of spectral snipers and exploding hand grenades, to the CAT-scan image of a dying friend. The themes of love and friendship, grief, despair, and hope had their first great expression in this story, and this dazzling new interpretation brings us into its thrall again.“A vibrant and vigorous reimagining of the world’s first book, which should take its place alongside Heaney’s \u003cb\u003eBeowulf\u003c\/b\u003e and Hughes’s\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eOvid\u003c\/b\u003e on the shelf of revivified classics.” —\u003ci\u003eThe New Statesman\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A brilliant version of an ancient tale; replete with humour, pathos, drama, and much more.\" –\u003ci\u003eThe Telegraph\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Derrek Hines makes Gilgamesh exciting.\" –\u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Hines's distinctive mode–part surreal, part cinematic–combines the concentration of lyric poetry with the narrative compulsion and fluency of an adventure story.\" –\u003ci\u003eTimes Literary Supplement\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\"Hines's energetic metaphors and nimble wit revivify the thrill of a very old tale.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e–\u003ci\u003eTimes\u003c\/i\u003e (London)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“An evocative lyric journey through the Mesopotamian story, glittering with Hines’ own fresh images.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Financial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A sparkling poetic vision.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Oxford Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Impressive, consistent . . . packed with good things.” —Christopher Logue\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I read this version with great interest and admiration. It has real energy and drive with some splendidly interesting images. I was held throughout.” —Ian Hamilton\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A superb achievement. The cinematic swoops, that terrific, loss-haunted elegy, absolutely packed with reverberating phrases. . . . It is not only a rendering of the poem but a brilliant, vital contemporary commentary on it.” —Paul Newman, editor, \u003cb\u003eAbraxis\u003c\/b\u003eDerrek Hines was born and raised in Canada and read Ancient Near Eastern Studies at university. He has won prizes in, among others, the National Poetry Competition and the Arvon Foundation International Competition, and has published two books of poetry. He lives on the Lizard Peninsula in Cornwall.\u003cb\u003eBeginnings\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHere is Gilgamesh, king of Uruk:\u003cbr\u003etwo-thirds divine, a mummy's boy, \u003cbr\u003ezeppelin ego, cock like a trip-hammer, \u003cbr\u003eand solid chrome, no-prisoners arrogance.\u003cbr\u003ePulls women like beer rings.\u003cbr\u003eGrunts when puzzled.\u003cbr\u003eA bully. A jock. Perfecto. But in love? - \u003cbr\u003ea moon-calf and worse, thoughtful.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNext, a one-off:\u003cbr\u003eclay and lightning entangled by the gods \u003cbr\u003eto create a strong-man from the wastelands \u003cbr\u003eto curb Gilgamesh -- named Enkidu.\u003cbr\u003eSour electric fear, desert mirage at your throat, \u003cbr\u003estrong enough to hold back the night, \u003cbr\u003eso handsome he robs the world of horizon - \u003cbr\u003efor no one's gaze lifts beyond him.\u003cbr\u003eGilgamesh and Enkidu stand \u003cbr\u003eastride the threshold of history at Sumer.\u003cbr\u003eFive thousand years, \u003cbr\u003eIshtar's skirts, \u003cbr\u003efive thousand years are gathered aside\u003cbr\u003eso we enter the view from Uruk's palace:\u003cbr\u003eEuphrates' airy, fish-woven halls, \u003cbr\u003ea sleep of reed beds, the eclat of date palms, \u003cbr\u003ewind-glossed corn. And in the distance\u003cbr\u003edesert -- the sun's loose gunpowder. \u003cbr\u003eGreen rolls up\u003cbr\u003eand rasps along it like a tongue \u003cbr\u003ewetting sandpaper.\u003cbr\u003eHere and there, \u003cbr\u003ejostling with the fast-forward business\u003cbr\u003eon the quays, spiralling above the potter's wheel, \u003cbr\u003ebuoyed by the clatter of cafe gossip:\u003cbr\u003eup-drafts of ideas, thermals of invention.\u003cbr\u003eFor the cut of every thought here \u003cbr\u003eis new for our race, and tart with novelty.\u003cbr\u003eThen look: footprints of the mind's bird \u003cbr\u003ein its take-off scramble across wet clay tablets. \u003cbr\u003eWriting!\u003cbr\u003eIt was also time\u003cbr\u003ewhen, just as the lemon tree's greenroom \u003cbr\u003esweats with auditions for tomorrow's sun, \u003cbr\u003ethe world swelled with potential heroes.\u003cbr\u003eHave there been two such \u003cbr\u003eas Gilgamesh and Enkidu \u003cbr\u003ewho released our first imagination\u003cbr\u003eto map the new interior spaces we still \u003cbr\u003escribble on the backs of envelopes, of lives?\u003cbr\u003eThey strode into deeds like furnaces \u003cbr\u003eto flash off the husk of their humanity, \u003cbr\u003eand emerged, purified of time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNow like a burning-glass Enkidu's wildness \u003cbr\u003eis focusing the people's discontent \u003cbr\u003einto dust devils of rumour\u003cbr\u003ethat scour through the city.\u003cbr\u003eThe Trapper is sent out, \u003cbr\u003eordered to hire a temple prostitute, \u003cbr\u003e'a garment of Ishtar'; lead her into the desert \u003cbr\u003eto civilise Enkidu -- net him \u003cbr\u003eto quell Gilgamesh.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShamhat of the April Gate\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat do we know of sacred harlots?\u003cbr\u003eWhat's sacred that sweeps through our lives? \u003cbr\u003eEnter Shamhat, who can be bought like a beer \u003cbr\u003efrom the stall outside the temple gate.\u003cbr\u003eTake her then as the whole, hired \u003cbr\u003emonth of April, of the gods' Now; \u003cbr\u003enot as equivalence but the month, \u003cbr\u003eharlot as might be April;\u003cbr\u003eShamhat as might be a modern woman \u003cbr\u003eslouched over a back-street bistro table \u003cbr\u003eher breasts too small to shadow yet, \u003cbr\u003eand in her bruises almost overdressed; \u003cbr\u003eskinny enough to dilute\u003cbr\u003ethe whisky-neon dawn.\u003cbr\u003eA cup of sleet, a grubby \u003cbr\u003etwo-cigarette mantra \u003cbr\u003eagainst the ache of breaching \u003cbr\u003ein her sex:\u003cbr\u003ethe month's raw, self-greasing tubers \u003cbr\u003eforcing up into shoots\u003cbr\u003ethe sap's hot green ether.\u003cbr\u003eAnd the drag-chute of Spring's afterbirth \u003cbr\u003enicked on the wind's thorn. \u003cbr\u003eCruel, cruellest and . . .\u003cbr\u003ea rag of love-things in free fall \u003cbr\u003ein her heart that shouldn't be here, \u003cbr\u003elike a man\u003cbr\u003e--like this one, the Trapper, \u003cbr\u003ewho draws her as the moon the slake-tide, \u003cbr\u003ethrough the desert\u003cbr\u003eto water Enkidu's lime-dry throat.\u003cbr\u003eAll the men who crutched her belly on bedsteads, \u003cbr\u003egorged her, ground her hips above the grave's \u003cbr\u003emattress, stand with her now.\u003cbr\u003e'I am Shamhat.' She fingers Enkidu's tangled hair. \u003cbr\u003e(A pro: her flashgun smile will develop \u003cbr\u003eto red-eye, his lust-eye.)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou have seen a cottage by the sea, \u003cbr\u003ewhite, lap-built against the spray, \u003cbr\u003epaused in the lilt of dunes \u003cbr\u003elike a skiff with feathered oars, \u003cbr\u003eits darkness waiting for summer.\u003cbr\u003eThen the shucking of winter shutters; \u003cbr\u003ethe abrupt gush and gulp of light \u003cbr\u003equenching a thirsting interior\u003cbr\u003elike un-boarding an old fountain:\u003cbr\u003ethus Enkidu's soul at Shamhat's touch.\u003cbr\u003eAnd his sadness, suddenly aware of what he is, \u003cbr\u003ea fumble of doubts and longings.\u003cbr\u003e'I am Shamhat.\u003cbr\u003ePart my gown and the keys at my girdle \u003cbr\u003ethat undo whore, undo mother, saint, \u003cbr\u003eto reveal the eternal carcass tipped in the beauty\u003cbr\u003eof the dunghill or the star-breeding towers in Orion.'\u003cbr\u003eTo Enkidu, who has known\u003cbr\u003eno other woman, she is beautiful.\u003cbr\u003eFrom the ruined face \u003cbr\u003ethe gentle voice, like a buddleia\u003cbr\u003eflowering through a derelict factory's window.\u003cbr\u003eHis fingers, calloused by freedom, \u003cbr\u003estruggle like netted birds \u003cbr\u003ewith the breathy sea-cotton of her layers \u003cbr\u003e(O my first woman!):\u003cbr\u003ethe wonder and nuzzle of breasts, \u003cbr\u003ethe notch that baits men \u003cbr\u003eas iron filings are drawn to fur a magnet.\u003cbr\u003eFinally Shamhat gasped a full-throated \u003cbr\u003epraise of male hydraulics, \u003cbr\u003eentering her like the stiff shaduf\u003cbr\u003ethat lifts night's constellations off the river's face, \u003cbr\u003espilling wet star-seed into the splayed canals.\u003cbr\u003eAfter seven nights of love, \u003cbr\u003eas a man might, \u003cbr\u003eEnkidu lost his understanding of animal speech. \u003cbr\u003eBut it was a fair trade.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Meeting\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDay\u003cbr\u003edescends;\u003cbr\u003ea hem (a garter?) now her thigh\u003cbr\u003eeases\u003cbr\u003einto the nevermore of dusk's entropy;\u003cbr\u003eand she looks back over her shoulder, \u003cbr\u003eup through the lush flip-book \u003cbr\u003eof her farewells.\u003cbr\u003eA line of crushed light remains above the horizon \u003cbr\u003eas if the shutters on a jeweller's window \u003cbr\u003ehad jammed an inch shy of closing;\u003cbr\u003espace enough\u003cbr\u003eto allow Enkidu and Shamhat \u003cbr\u003eto materialise before Uruk's gate.\u003cbr\u003eStreet urchins gawk; donkeys absorb. \u003cbr\u003eA town guide peels from the shadows, \u003cbr\u003eapproaches, and falls back in awe.\u003cbr\u003eEnkidu has come to strip Gilgamesh \u003cbr\u003eof his right to taste the bride before the husband. \u003cbr\u003eThe foundry of his anger quakes and glows.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey push through the streets without torches; \u003cbr\u003eShamhat, three paces behind, \u003cbr\u003elights his way.\u003cbr\u003eEnkidu is troubled, his anger flawed. \u003cbr\u003eDoubt tears at certainty --\u003cbr\u003ea risk the self-righteous must take --\u003cbr\u003efor what he expects\u003cbr\u003ehe might not find.\u003cbr\u003eBut her? Watch her. She is changing,\u003cbr\u003euncloaking from a chrysalis of desert calico \u003cbr\u003ethat shimmers and wings to silk in her slipstream \u003cbr\u003ea hundred feet into air\u003cbr\u003eborrowed from Heaven.\u003cbr\u003eThe volume of her presence \u003cbr\u003esoars beyond the audible; \u003cbr\u003eshe reveals herself like a female Odysseus \u003cbr\u003etransfixing the suitors;\u003cbr\u003ebursts from Penelope's weaving, \u003cbr\u003eand with her swarm \u003cbr\u003ethe hungry threads of power.\u003cbr\u003eShe is no longer the 'garment of Ishtar' \u003cbr\u003ebut its very owner, striding down \u003cbr\u003ethe cat-walk of Uruk's high street \u003cbr\u003ein the designer gowns of Paradise, \u003cbr\u003eIshtar's high priestess, Goddess incarnate; \u003cbr\u003eso briefly glimpsed in passing, \u003cbr\u003ethe grace of her, \u003cbr\u003elike snow touching warm ground.\u003cbr\u003eHip to hip, Shamhat and light, \u003cbr\u003epart the darkness; of the two \u003cbr\u003eshe is the more radiant.\u003cbr\u003eEnkidu sees none of this;\u003cbr\u003ebroods and stomps on.\u003cbr\u003eSoft-mouthed as a gundog \u003cbr\u003edark retrieves these few sounds:\u003cbr\u003ea clatter of supper plates, \u003cbr\u003ethe dry thresh, like a woman's stockings, \u003cbr\u003eof palm fronds,\u003cbr\u003ethe rustle of moonlight, rinsing itself \u003cbr\u003eup to its wrists in the river.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAcross town, Gilgamesh \u003cbr\u003esets off to split a bride's veil\u003cbr\u003ewhile the groom groans white with shame. \u003cbr\u003eHis right? Divine right, power right. \u003cbr\u003eIn reverse order.\u003cbr\u003eAround him in the swelter-light \u003cbr\u003esmuts off reed torches cling \u003cbr\u003eto the sweating skin of his young bucks, \u003cbr\u003ethe town's jeunesse doree, \u003cbr\u003enervy as water splattered on hot oil; \u003cbr\u003etoo drunk for honour, but hoping \u003cbr\u003efor woman-scraps from his table.\u003cbr\u003eHe has corrupted their worth \u003cbr\u003ewith his vanity, yet \u003cbr\u003ethey mime his airs, ape his swagger, \u003cbr\u003etry on his used breath\u003cbr\u003eto live second-hand, \u003cbr\u003ehand-me-down time, \u003cbr\u003ealways in fear of that whetted anger, \u003cbr\u003ehalf-drawn in his pride's sheath.\u003cbr\u003eTo him they are means.\u003cbr\u003eGilgamesh squats on Uruk's soul.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA messenger stands before the king, \u003cbr\u003ehis mouth working like a boated trout, \u003cbr\u003eor a seer fresh out of prophecy. \u003cbr\u003eSilence, a bolt, rigid in the throat. \u003cbr\u003eEmpty cups of faces turn to Gilgamesh.\u003cbr\u003eInstantly everything is known -- \u003cbr\u003ethe news clamps jump-cables to them\u003cbr\u003eand throws a switch -- a current arcs and spits\u003cbr\u003ebetween Gilgamesh here, \u003cbr\u003eand Enkidu at the April Gate, \u003cbr\u003egalvanising the town.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTalk dries in the cafes,\u003cbr\u003e as when the soldiers of an occupation\u003cbr\u003eenter a restaurant, and a coded silence \u003cbr\u003ebecomes speech. Where silence is language, \u003cbr\u003emeaning is everywhere.\u003cbr\u003eThe people let fear think for them; \u003cbr\u003efear steals their thought and makes bold. \u003cbr\u003eThey watch Gilgamesh pass, \u003cbr\u003eand chant under their breath,\u003cbr\u003elike football fans from the terraces:\u003cbr\u003eDead. End. Cul-de-sac. \u003cbr\u003eDead. End. Cul-de-sac.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eStill, as the heroes stumble into their roles,\u003cbr\u003ethere is someone, as always, disconnected -- \u003cbr\u003esomeone whistling as he repairs a pot -- \u003cbr\u003eunmindful of the great events at his elbow\u003cbr\u003elike the ploughman oblivious in Brueghel's \u003cbr\u003eFall of Icarus.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is done; they accelerate towards each other \u003cbr\u003ewelded to Destiny's tram rails: two black cores \u003cbr\u003ehungry for the other's light.\u003cbr\u003eJuggernauts too wide for the narrow streets \u003cbr\u003ethey spew tall coxcombs of sparks \u003cbr\u003eas they grind against the buildings. \u003cbr\u003eThey meet in the square, and stop.\u003cbr\u003eHaste scissors off their clothes:\u003cbr\u003eEnkidu's furs, drop and crouch;\u003cbr\u003ethe king's double silks (light blue, indigo, \u003cbr\u003elike the two breezes off opposed seas \u003cbr\u003ewhich ruffle the sheep's fleece on Hellespont)\u003cbr\u003efaint to the ground -- \u003cbr\u003eboth men now qualities of moonlight.\u003cbr\u003eSudden jostling in the crowd:\u003cbr\u003ethe fight is hijacked by the expectations \u003cbr\u003eof spectacle -- paparazzi:\u003cbr\u003eflashbulbs sun the moon aside \u003cbr\u003ecarving a tableau, a stark iconography \u003cbr\u003eof function without emotion.\u003cbr\u003eThe contestants are burnished gold-leaf,\u003cbr\u003ewetted crimson in the glare; \u003cbr\u003eheraldic beasts on a carousel, \u003cbr\u003ehuge, stupid with encoded exhibition.\u003cbr\u003eThey topple into each other \u003cbr\u003elike the Empire State and Chrysler buildings; \u003cbr\u003etheir hearts trapped in the elevators, \u003cbr\u003etheir minds locked in the blueprints \u003cbr\u003eof testosterone flush and muscle.\u003cbr\u003eFierce, so saturated, dense with power, they are become \u003cbr\u003ea gravity: voices and light bend nearing them. \u003cbr\u003eThey drain cities of energy from each other \u003cbr\u003eand draw on more: distant Lakish dims, \u003cbr\u003eUr browns out . . .\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUntil, from behind the crowd, Shamhat speaks. \u003cbr\u003eOnly the wrestlers hear her voice, \u003cbr\u003e200 cubic miles of summer storm, compressed, \u003cbr\u003ecompressed: -- it begins as\u003cbr\u003ea wet finger rubbed around the rim of a wine glass; \u003cbr\u003eincreases to a whisper, gears up to a rumble \u003cbr\u003ecircling a bronze chamber in their heads -- \u003cbr\u003efaster -- until the words burst in their skulls:\u003cbr\u003eTHE GODS ORDAIN FRIENDSHIP.\u003cbr\u003eAnger is reversed so violently\u003cbr\u003ethey are motion sick with the change\u003cbr\u003eand the challenge of foreignness, \u003cbr\u003eas when, in the uncertainty of abroad, \u003cbr\u003eyou find you are a question, \u003cbr\u003enot the answer you thought yourself to be.\u003cbr\u003eBackwards from the clinch, dream-escaping; \u003cbr\u003esmile into eyes . . .\u003cbr\u003eThe crowd murmurs, restive with discontent. \u003cbr\u003eA formula has been betrayed. The fight ends \u003cbr\u003enot in justice as they expected:\u003cbr\u003eShamhat imposed the epiphany of recognition, \u003cbr\u003ewhich is greater than justice and love. \u003cbr\u003eBut it is not resolution.\u003cbr\u003eGilgamesh takes one heady step, two; \u003cbr\u003eliving for the first time\u003cbr\u003efor someone else.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGilgamesh's Hymn to Morning\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSee, dawn breathes into . . . the flaws:\u003cbr\u003erumour behind bitumen, \u003cbr\u003efalse-dawn cock crow, current surge . . . \u003cbr\u003eDark's unstable touch-paper splutters \u003cbr\u003eand launches the invention of\u003cbr\u003eSUN -- gold vaporised at dew point\u003cbr\u003eflash-plating the river's laid steel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'O, great spinnaker of morning, \u003cbr\u003ebellied by a wind\u003cbr\u003etaller than the meadows of Orion,\u003cbr\u003ethat pulls into its cavitation thought -- \u003cbr\u003ethe spindrift off the impossible -- \u003cbr\u003ethe first draw of worked, imaginable space\u003cbr\u003ethat roils and oils and charms mind\u003cbr\u003einto a downright love of it.\u003cbr\u003eFor is thought not the greatest mystery, \u003cbr\u003eand imagination a metaphor \u003cbr\u003efor its beauty and wonder?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Come, my brother -- \u003cbr\u003ea broad jest of sunlight\u003cbr\u003eclowns on the sills of day\u003cbr\u003ejust as we entertain the gods, \u003cbr\u003eour doings like oar-prints \u003cbr\u003efilling with the provinces of Heaven.\u003cbr\u003eAnd all is written: Fate already chalked \u003cbr\u003eon the lofting floor, the theorems of grace, \u003cbr\u003ethe tracings of wind's plumed assumption. \u003cbr\u003eLift your arms and sail.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Listen: noon \u003cbr\u003eevaporates from the water-clock;\u003cbr\u003enoon, on the slack-clutched river\u003cbr\u003ewhere light lists a degree, furls and crumples \u003cbr\u003elike a xebec shrugging its sails off the wind.\u003cbr\u003eThis is honey time, Enkidu, \u003cbr\u003eand we stand braced on the walls of Uruk \u003cbr\u003eas at the kerb of dreams.\u003cbr\u003eLet us tread them like gods,\u003cbr\u003efor, my friend, such days are gifts, \u003cbr\u003evictories over the immense indifference.\u003cbr\u003eWe will inhale this, our life's dawn \u003cbr\u003eevaporating off a god's brow; grasp time by its scruff; \u003cbr\u003ebrave the entry-only land of the hero,\u003cbr\u003eand not return: for once we've stepped into it, \u003cbr\u003ethe people never allow the hero\u003cbr\u003eto be a part of them again.\u003cbr\u003eThere we are to capture for thought, \u003cbr\u003eunmarked, stateless spaces in the mind, \u003cbr\u003eand leave them outside the walls for mankind.'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHeroes. Consider, reader: heroes. \u003cbr\u003eThe whole idea waiting to abuse itself. \u003cbr\u003eThe modernist in us undercutting \u003cbr\u003eeverything to be said here, \u003cbr\u003ewith that taste for the corruption of the ideal, \u003cbr\u003ethe soured, smug edge of bankrupt irony \u003cbr\u003edefending us from belief, that 'safety in derision'.\u003cbr\u003eWe can be ironical with the matter of the issue, \u003cbr\u003ebut not its spirit. That\u003cbr\u003einhales dawns.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe Humbaba Campaign\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e(A soldier's diary)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe councillors were dead against the madness -- \u003cbr\u003ea thousand miles to Lebanon for cedar \u003cbr\u003eand squander the toff's precious Hooray Henrys \u003cbr\u003eagainst Humbaba's troops . . .\u003cbr\u003eBut our lord Gilgamesh strutted and harangued:\u003cbr\u003eshrivel-calves, rattle-scrotums, \u003cbr\u003efear's banquet, etc.\u003cbr\u003eA dark voice, tar brushed over rust. \u003cbr\u003eWe clocked there was something rotten.\u003cbr\u003eThe while he was glancing at pretty-boy Enkidu. \u003cbr\u003eYou could see that edged glint in their eyes. \u003cbr\u003eThey got off on it, \u003cbr\u003eegging each other on, dicks on the table.\u003cbr\u003eCedar for the temple doors, my ass. \u003cbr\u003eIt's glory's hard-on for those two, \u003cbr\u003eand no mind for us. Bastards.\u003cbr\u003eWe were at ease in ranks for all this, \u003cbr\u003ewith no idea who Humbaba was; but the corporal \u003cbr\u003eturned pale as blanco: 'He's the worst, \u003cbr\u003eworse than watching your children burn alive \u003cbr\u003eand surviving it. If we live after this show\u003cbr\u003ewe'll carry a hell even death won't ease. \u003cbr\u003eHe's a wizard, a quantum entanglement magus, \u003cbr\u003eset by Enlil, Fate Maker, \u003cbr\u003eto guard the Sacred Cedars in Lebanon.,\u003cbr\u003eSo, we figured, no snatch for medals in this caper.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA month now, desert-yomping in full kit. \u003cbr\u003eScorpion wind in the face, crotch rot, boils. \u003cbr\u003eNot helped by our great King, who wakes each morning \u003cbr\u003efrom dreams like multiple car crashes -- \u003cbr\u003ea bloody Cassandra weeping catastrophe, \u003cbr\u003euntil Enkidu talks him round.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the valley of the Bekaa under Mt Lebanon. \u003cbr\u003eEasy soldiering with the ladies willing, \u003cbr\u003etheir legs spread wide as a peal of bells;\u003cbr\u003eplenty of grub, and the zig of split-stone fences \u003cbr\u003esnaking through terraced orchards, \u003cbr\u003eapple and Eve ready.\u003cbr\u003eGood, rolling chariot country.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe foothills. Our yeomanry \u003cbr\u003egot stuck into Humbaba's lot this morning. \u003cbr\u003eWe watched them shake out\u003cbr\u003einto order of battle, advancing at a stroll \u003cbr\u003eup the meadow towards the forest\u003cbr\u003eas they dressed to the right, \u003cbr\u003elike a list of names justifying into columns \u003cbr\u003efor the face of a war memorial.\u003cbr\u003eThree hundred yards beyond return \u003cbr\u003ethe telegram-maker of enemy fire \u003cbr\u003escythed out from the tree-line, \u003cbr\u003eand the ranks started to crumple.\u003cbr\u003eMen dying into grass;\u003cbr\u003eall those souls whistling past our heads, \u003cbr\u003ehomewards.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe supported the chariots today -- \u003cbr\u003esoft-shelled tanks on a leash, \u003cbr\u003edesperate to harden with speed, \u003cbr\u003ebut forced to slow into single file though the woods, \u003cbr\u003esoft again.\u003cbr\u003eEveryone screwed up to pitch; the recruits \u003cbr\u003elike twists of green gunpowder. \u003cbr\u003eFrom the flank we watched the ambush's fusillade \u003cbr\u003esieve most of them to Hell","brand":"Anchor","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301226631397,"sku":"NP9781400077335","price":14.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781400077335.jpg?v=1767728130","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/gilgamesh-isbn-9781400077335","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}