Before the Fall of Babylon

Poem By: Owojori Jeremiah.

On an extant fertile plain
between two brilliant rivers
a complex pantheon of sacred deities
did exist
But all of this was well before
the preeminent caliphate
decided to invade
At this time
during the reign of the ancient law giver,
Hammurabi,
the greatest god was Marduk,
an esteemed figure who brought order
to what might have been described
as the rabid blood sucking chaos
that has often plagued man
as the precursor to a disordered
slipshod mind
From this point onward
deep within the golden cradle
it is said that Marduk rose to the occasion
Forever merging himself with developments
in mathematics, science and astronomy
In fact the divine order of the planets
weighed heavily upon the cosmology of the people
sanctioning the authority of the sacred rites
of an ancient King
But in this regard
we may look to his predecessors
In An we find the sky god, the god of heaven
and lord of the universal constellations
For each star is a soldier
who will impose the events of nature
as they were created to unfold
In his infinite wisdom
An had the ability to impose justice
and upheld the legal code from which it came
For no man had the right
to evict his son unless their was due reason
If a son has perpetrated an evil act against his father
he must be forgiven the first time
And if a doctor operates upon a patient and the patient dies
the doctor shall be put to death
And in Enlil, the god of air
we find the loyal and faithful cohort
who was able to converse with the sky
and influence the farthest reaches of the universe
It is said that Enlil first appeared
in a consummate ceremony as the god of heaven
merged with the goddess of the earth
Yet the god of the wind proved to be much more
than just a manifestation of sexual passion and might
With astonishing fortitude
this god of nature possessed the power
of innumerable warriors
Once responsible for the origin of man
the god of weather turned his back
allowing countless people to perish in a flood
In another instance however
Enlil proved instrumental as he enlisted Ninurta,
the god of war to slay Asag,
a horrifying demon that was often accompanied
by spirited rocks that were born of his relationship
with the mountains
It is said that his ability to wreak havoc was so severe
that he was able to boil fish as they swam in the rivers