The Truth About Dying

All sorts of things die

Only one kind of mind does

As far as it knows

Everything that begins to live has begun to die

We should not be so worried about what follows death

The ghost of Norm MacDonald chuckles

While alive, he solved this riddle

In his own, madly ingenious way

What happens after you die?

You are found

But that's not what we meant

Which Norm knew

Why get so worked up about a question to which there is no answer?

After all, whoever knows anything

Knows it in a way we can't understand

Why don't we discuss dying, which we are busy doing?

We know something about that

Though we shy away from calling it by name

Sorry, that might be uncomfortable

Just relax

Imagine being a beetle

You really can't, right?

At best, you can imagine being you

In the form of a beetle

Not you specifically, I suppose

Though most of us seem always to be thinking

Secretly, sometimes; with a hint of shame or guilt

About ourselves

Or about who others think we are

Because we're not sure what to think

Until we see some numbers, and figure out

What most people make of things

Which is a great way to be sure

That few will ever think what has not already been thought

Stop thinking like a focus group

How can we act and speak and think in a novel, strange way

That might allow us to know what we have been talking about for so long

To no good effect

From a fresh perspective

Say, that of a person in another form

Remember the beetle

Then, we might come to understand

That once you are no longer in a hale and healthy human form

Once you are dying, or a living reminder that all of us must

You become the subject of sotto voce conversations

Exchanges of worried looks

Condescending rumors that knit eyebrows and clutch pearls

And thus, an object in most respects

Of scrutiny, of derision, of doubt, of pity, of scorn

An inconvenience, a burden, a potential problem

Worst and ugliest, the euphemism "a challenge"

Like a crossword puzzle, or mold in the bathroom

Something to be dealt with

And never dealt into the game again

You're still alive, still moving, still moved

You know that you are being treated like something

Rather than someone

But your knowledge doesn't matter

Your body does

And if it is strange, or sick, or slowly coming apart

You are a flashing red when there is too much traffic

And everyone just wants to get on with the trip

Which is what it's all about, really

Making the trip comfortable and safe

As much fun as possible

Without any idea how it began

And only the vaguest hint as to where it is going

No one wants to be delayed

Or given any directions by some

Patronizing busybody who doesn't get it:

You've just got to get going

If you stop to look around

You might not see the point of going on

The whole place is falling apart

While we lie to each other about how good it looks

And mistake politics and culture for the in flight entertainment

Sure, we might crash in the middle of this

But we won't be bored

Boredom may be acute awareness of time

Without the wisdom to see where it is taking us

Or, more gently, with the will to pretend we don't know

Perhaps that is why

Plagues rob us of the capacity to wait

Patience has been clinging to the edge in the ICU

Since COVID

Is that over, by the way?

Best not to think about it, I guess

Who knows?

We don't have time

We could be sick tomorrow

Dead in a week

Who knows?

Just make it bearable

Until it ends

Get on with it

The beetle dies

Not seeing it coming

But in that shape

Each of us would

The dread, the anxiety, the fear, the anger

Would flash through the nervous system of that insect

Just as they are flashing through us now

We do not have much time

We must take this seriously

We're dying bodies who know it

And we know that all of us know it

Look. I wrote this

You are reading it

We're life in a specific, simian shape

With a short shelf life

And a mind that knows it's not a body

Inside a body that acts pretty mindless

We ought to act like dying minds

We are not anything other than what we are

Much as we might wish we were

So much, in fact, that we'll buy all sorts of stories

That let us think this isn't our real life

But this is our real life

Like it or not

It's brief, but seems long when you're bored

When you don't have time to think

Or have persuaded yourself that you don't

But you do, you know

Now