em’s Reviews > Gilgamesh: A New English Version > Status Update

“...suddenly, savagely, death/destroys us, all of us, old or young./and yet we build houses, make contracts, brothers/divide their inheritance, conflicts occur—/as though this human life lasted forever./the river rises, flows over its banks/and carries us all away, like mayflies/floating downstream: they stare at the sun,/then all at once there is nothing.”