Kadesh

Despite their later treaty,

A copy of which still hangs

In the United Nations

Complex in New York City—

World neither Rameses nor

The Hittites could imagine

At the time of that treaty—

And despite all the later

Treaties, as well, the Battle

Of Kadesh never ended—

That battle’s been going on

For thirty-three hundred years.

The Hittites kept encroaching

On Egypt’s northern frontier

For nearly a century,

But a young pharaoh ordered

Up masses of weapons and

Rearmed his military,

And rode north himself with them,

The greatest chariot force

Assembled in history,

Only to blunder into

An ambush outside Kadesh

Thanks to bad intelligence.

Routed, his forces regrouped.

He got help from his allies.

Hittites got help from their own.

Technologies were tested—

Three-wheeled chariots proved slow,

Easily overtaken—

Lighter chariots better.

Rameses survived and drove

The Hittite chariots back

Through the Orontes river,

Drowning some, back to their fort,

Their Citadel of Kadesh—

Itself on an ancient tell

Once defending someone else.

Then the pharaoh rode back home

And proclaimed his victory,

Carving it large to prove it.

He still rides on his stela,

Aiming his mighty arrow.

Hittites saw it differently.

They had defended Kadesh.

More than a decade after,

Border towns were still swapping

Occupying forces. Then,

Finally, the great treaty,

Now feted as the oldest

Example of such a text.

Near that Kadesh citadel,

A city now stands, named Homs.

Stands is maybe generous.

Homs has been gutted itself,

Most of its people slaughtered

In a very recent war

Not even declared ended,

Violence orchestrated

By large and little powers.

Some have lost, some just hang on,

But nobody’s really won—

While just north of what had been

The Hittites’ own northern forts,

Already fresh war’s begun,

Involving some of the same

Forces that demolished Homs—

Terrifying precedent

For the cities being bombed.

All the old cliches get asked

Whenever the great battle

Of Kadesh starts up again—

Has there ever been a street

Hasn’t run with human blood,

Once someone else wants that town?

Don’t weep too much. War is kind—

It will let peace creep back in.

No matter how this war ends,

Fresh treaties will be agreed.

Statutes will be passed and praised.

Statues will be razed and raised.

Historians will debate

Who really lost and who won,

And, after all’s said and done,

More history will begin.

True. Before too many years,

Kadesh starts over again.