Ogipung: the frog that writes

Death marches with Time, its shadows lengthening with each year that we pass.

The first experience of Death might be a great grandparent–as young children, we don’t notice the details. It just happened: they just passed away. They simply are NOT anymore. Life is too full of other things to learn, too full of pretty things, Death is just a mere nightmare for children.

By our second experience of Death, it’s starting to flex its grip on us. We accompany a loved one through stages of Death: sickness, hospitalization, episodes of goodbyes, and the end. It started to dawn on us that death is a reality, and it’s ugly. But deep down we still think that Death is still a long way away. In our 20s or 30s, our health is a good distraction, banishing the shadows of Death to a corner.

By adulthood, Death plays a game of catch-up with Time: one-by-one, like leaves falling in the autumn, we see our friends leaving us, and Death intimately shares with us its darkness. And we begin to expect it to come down on us anytime.

When the time comes, how will I cope with Death?

Some go in and come back out / Some go in to stay for a while / Some go in and come out incomplete / Yet others / They go in to pass to the other Side

“Hospital”