I sat with Death once. She was not hooded. She was not cruel. She smelled of rain-soaked soil and woodsmoke. She leaned close, and her breath was the story of my ancestors.
She said, “Why do you fear me? I am the pause between drumbeats. I am the silence before the next inhale. I am the mirror that will not lie.”
I wanted to argue. I wanted to cling. Instead, I listened.
Her voice was a river running backward, carrying bones to the mountain, carrying prayers to the sky. She said: “Every end is a seed.”
And I believed her. Because in her lap, I saw them — seeds glowing like embers, whispering like children yet unborn. Endings are not voids. They are beginnings folded inward, waiting to rise.
Death does not steal. She teaches. She strips away the lie that we are infinite flesh and hands us the truth that we are infinite spirit. She takes only the shell. She leaves us the song.
I wrote her name in the air. It shimmered. It did not vanish. It settled into my chest, and I understood: I had been carrying her all along. Not as punishment. Not as fear. As companion. As teacher. As the friend who waits at the end of the road with open arms.
