He is at the mouth of the rivers and does not come back
Resonance
Those who survived and do not know what they are for now
Symbols
The boatThe doveThe ravenThe mouth of the rivers
Mythology Summary
Utnapishtim is the flood survivor of Gilgamesh XI. Warned by Ea, he builds a cube-shaped boat, takes aboard his family, his craftsmen and the animals, rides out the seven-day flood, and when the waters fall sends out a dove, a swallow and then a raven that does not come back. He lands and makes sacrifice, the gods smell it and crowd round, and Enlil - who had not wanted him saved - blesses him and his wife and makes them immortal, to live far away at the mouth of the rivers (Gilgamesh XI). Gilgamesh comes to him at the end of the epic to ask about death, and is given the plant of life and loses it to a snake.
Modern Practice
Utnapishtim is worked with for surviving a thing that was meant to end you, and for the strangeness of being the one left. The practice is the account: he is the man who tells the story of the flood, and the telling is what he has instead of an ordinary death. He is asked for endurance and for distance, not for favours.