Fortnight Journal
Feb 6, 2012
Dead bodies are given to “funeral professionals” who have degrees in vaguely sciency behind-closed-doors body handlin’. But no matter how civilized we become, no matter how many buildings or nuclear reactors we build, nature always seethes just beneath the surface with its primary desire for destruction and renewal.
So what have we done to combat this fierce mortal reality? We clean up our bodies. We ensure they are orderly and sanitized, pumping them full of decomposition-slowing chemicals so they can’t reflect anything back at us that we don’t want to see. Or, we burn them immediately. Either way, the dead today cannot do what they have done for thousands of years: warn us, the living.
Read the full article in the Fortnight Journal
