DEATH

I hear that death has many faces.

I hear that it could be a booby trap or an unfortunate electrocution. It could be a slip on a wet floor or a rotting of an organ. It could be a mugging or a drunk driver.

I hear that we are powerless to stop death, that we can only push for a little more time, and when that expires, we ask for a little more.

Life is termed the opposite of what death is. And so, life is lived to the fullest. Some live without apology, bulldozing everything and everyone in their way. Others squeak through life, afraid of their shadows, running back into their shells at the slightest hint of what is not familiar.

Life is white and black and grey, and there are a few reasons why it is not as colorful as one may wish. Life is greed and violence and hurt and pain and truth and sorrow and sadness and joy and comfort and hope and love and kindness.

Life is a plethora of sorts. 

A combination of opposites running in parallel directions. 

A puzzle, incomplete.

I read stories of men who search for ways to cheat Death, to beat Death at its own game. They plunder libraries, dig up the sacred and trample on graves and are fooled by fragments of ideas that never were.

Death’s kingdom is sentient. Mortals call it by different names – Hades, Sheol, Abbadon, the underworld, and the nether realm. 

But it is all of those and none at all. 

Death sifts through time, it is present at births, welcoming new life even as it begins the countdown for an old one. Death is in the water and the air and the land.

Life is in the roaring of the oceans and in the number of ribs standing out against thin flesh. Life is in the avoidable, the impenetrable, and the porous. Life is hopeful to a fault, its optimism disgusts sometimes.

The finality of death showers the individual with great clarity. And in those final moments, which may be years, days, weeks, or precious minutes, the individual realises that all life is fragile, all dreams are wisps of smoke curling in the air, and death may be a better peace offering.

The End.

I wrote this for something I can't remember.

I think that it was for a magazine.

This is the second in my rejections and never-made-it-out-into-the-world series.

What do you think of Death?

Photo by Mariana Montrazi on Pexels.

I picked this photo because I like the blur.